Partita by Barbara Kingsolver

A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK

“Kingsolver’s magnificent Partita sings in the key of passion, yearning, and loss.” — The Boston Globe

“A lush and wrenching narrative about the paths not taken, the ingenuity of music and human decency.” — New York Times (“Ten New Books We Recommend This Week”)

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Demon Copperhead, a story of a brief, passionate, life-changing love affair, wrapped up in what might be the greatest romance of all: our eternal human longing for art and beauty.

Livia Cable has made her peace with her marriage and modest livelihood in the farm country where she grew up, until a shocking phone call from an old lover shakes her to the core. Decades earlier, this man knew her as Livia Bohusz, a music conservatory student estranged from her home and family, uncertain of anything except her passion for music and promise as an extraordinary pianist. His request, now, to see her again stirs up ghosts she’s kept at bay for a lifetime.

Shifting between past and present, Livia’s decision to meet or reject the reunion means confronting step by step, in memories framed as musical dances, the experiences of childhood loss, abandonment, self-immolating passion, and perilous attachment to a man who broke her belief in love and ruptured the course of her life.

With razor-sharp acuity and deep affection, Kingsolver’s unforgettable new novel reflects on class barriers, the risks of ambition, and the timeless, life-changing power of art.