I read this book because my girlfriend--who loved it--recommended it to me. She also implied that I could stand to girly up my reading list a little, which is probably fair. Man does not live by novelizations of '70s cop movies and '80s slasher movie tie-ins alone.

Anyway, I thought it was good. The characters were all likable and the story was engaging, if wholly improbable (Bel Canto could just as easily have been titled The Lighter Side of Stockholm Syndrome). My main problem with it was the writing style, which I really didn't care for. Each sentence is perfectly crafted, and would make any MFA writing professor thrilled, but therein lies the problem. The writing is so well-crafted sentence by sentence that it ends up being somewhat characterless and a little dull in large portions. The prose in Bel Canto almost seemed as if it was written to specifically defy any editorial criticisms. It does this with aplomb, but the problem is that it never takes any risks either.

Books are so subjective. No matter how much we know this, it’s still shocking to love a book and see that others hated it, or to hate a book that others loved. It’s the same for everything else in life: people, films, TV shows, vacation spots, singers, etc. etc. We are all so very different.

Sometimes, when I finish a book, if I didn’t like it, I will usually have very concrete reasons why I did not. And sometimes I will have very concrete reasons why I did like a book. But often, as is the case with BEL CANTO, it’s simply because the book touched me in a way that I personally can appreciate.

Ann Patchett writes a beautiful story of a lavish birthday party in a small South American country gone wrong. A group of gun-wielding terrorists interrupt a party for a Japanese businessman (at the residence of the Vice President), hoping to take the president hostage and be on their way. But the President is home watching his favorite soap opera, and is nowhere to be found. The terrorists make a quick decision to take the multi-national group of party guests hostage, most notably opera star, Roxane Coss, the party honoree, Mr. Hosokawa, his translator, Gen, the country’s Vice President, a local priest, and many others.

I like character-based stories, especially when they are exceptionally well written. I enjoyed seeing how the hostages and the terrorists interacted over a period of months, especially with music as the central theme. I found it quite interesting to watch how relationships developed and blossomed between members of the eclectic group of people who found themselves living together in the vice presidential residence.

This is my kind of book as I’m a true people watcher. I can appreciate why it might not be for everyone, especially those preferring more action than interaction, but for me it was a beautiful story with some very tense, poignant and engaging moments.

I originally picked this Ann Patchett book as my follow-up to The Dutch House in part because it was her most read novel. But also because it seemed to be the most action-packed; reading the blurb felt like a thriller or heist movie. I mean, there’s a massive kidnapping of powerful people from all over the world by South American terrorists at a Japanese man’s birthday party featuring a famous American singer. But what it ended up being was a lot of ...sitting .....waiting .........and translating.

That’s probably my mistake for interpreting the description incorrectly. Patchett has a pretty distinct writing style and point of view that I should have picked up on earlier. Bel Canto isn’t plot-driven, it’s all about the interactions between individuals ensnared in each others lives as they deal with difficult circumstances. Her characters are rich and layered and I never tire of meeting a new one.

So if you’re looking for something fast-paced and suspenseful, this probably won’t be for you. Not to say this book is boring, it’s not, but that’s probably due to the writing. Patchett writes mundanity with such an elegant flair that you might not have even noticed you just read 20 pages about the vocal exercises involved with singing opera.

....Which was one of the bigger sticking points for me. I just don’t think opera is as big of a deal as, apparently, everyone in this novel thinks it is. Won’t go too deep into the specifics without a spoiler tag, but it’s just utterly bizarre and pushing believability that a group of 59, mostly men, half teenage boys who have never seen television before, would be so incredibly moved by an opera soprano that they crown her their unofficial princess. How is everyone proclaiming their love for her after, what, a week or less? I feel like Patchett may be one of those people who deeply appreciates opera and maybe she’s projecting a bit here, but every teenage or young guy I know would have zero interest in listening to that kind of music. I would sum it up with this:

Roxanne successfully negotiating with terrorists:


And sorry to keep using the spoiler tag, but I really don’t have any other option! This ending was a slow march to an expected fate, but one that you were actively hoping wouldn’t be the case. It makes sense, especially once I found out this was inspired loosely on the Japanese embassy hostage crisis of 1996 in Peru, so it couldn’t really end up any other way, could it? I wasn’t clear whether the captives ever acknowledged that they had Stockholm-Syndrome or if they kept the facade going, but maybe that was intentional. I did feel like killing Mr. Hosokawa and Carmen gave them a way out of dealing with the ramifications of their choices during those several months, once they were on the outside.

I also found Gen and Carmen’s relationship creepy. He is a fully grown man, and she’s a teenager half his age. He’s a hostage and she’s a child soldier who can’t read. This was just too fucked up to be actually romanticized.

In the two books of hers I’ve read, Patchett has a type of understated devastation that keeps looping around in my head. It’s hard to shake. And even when it’s difficult to say “I loved“ something so melancholic, I do deeply appreciate it.

Bel Canto is the second book I've read by Ann Patchett. Commonwealth was the first and I loved it. I'd been wanting to read Bel Canto for a long time. I liked some of the book but there were parts of it that really seemed to drag on and I had no problem setting it aside at intervals. I felt like the action came very! late in the story. The ending was fine, however, I wasn't thrilled (or even kind of pleased) with the epilogue. For all the hype I'd hear about this book, it was somewhat of a letdown. That said, I liked the overall story enough to want to finish it.

Four stars because I'm going to pretend the ridiculous epilogue doesn't exist.

Ann Patchett, Bel Canto (Harper, 2001)

I have spent quite a while mulling this over, and have finally come to the conclusion that, patterned after Greek tragic opera or not, I can't forgive Ann Patchett for the climax of this novel. Much of that has to do with the beginning of the novel; I'd have been inclined to be more forgiving had the first hundred pages not moved at a snail's pace. But the book finally picked up, everything was going along swimmingly, and then, suddenly, bam-the most predictable possible climax.

The story is based on accounts of the guerrilla takeover of the Peruvian embassy in 1992, but Patchett moves the action to another, unnamed, South American country and adds a few extra ingredients into the mix. In Patchett's story, opera singer Roxane Coss has been lured to the embassy for the birthday party of a wealthy Japanese industrialist whom the country hopes will build a factory there. During the festivities, the guerrillas invade, and a hostage situation begins. It drags on, and soon the strict militarism with which the siege begins evolves into a more relaxed system, where the line between terrorist and hostage begins to blur.

It's after that line begins to blur that the book really takes hold. The original three chapters, that describe the scene and introduce us to most of the main characters, are painfully slow. Patchett hits her stride, and the book takes off. For the middle two hundred pages, it's easy to see why the book won the Orange Prize and was shortlisted for so many others.

Then comes the climax. My initial reaction is that it was the biggest letdown I'd had in a novel in a number of years, and that's saying something. After some discussion, I tried to accept it as the pace and events of the book being modeled on Greek tragic opera (where such clichés as the climax of this novel were coined). I don't know enough about Greek tragic opera to really make a judgment one way or the other as to the accuracy of Patchett's patterning. I do know that in modern reinterpretations of older works (think Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres for an excellent example), what we often change is what has become clichéd in the years since the work was originally written. Such is not the case here, and it certainly kept me from enjoying the book as a whole as much as I otherwise would have.

Great middle. Mediocre beginning. Awful ending. Still, the hundred pages that are worth saving are remarkable, and worth the price of admission. ** ½

Ann Patchett is such a skillful writer. This is, to date, the oldest book of hers that I've read and I can see how she's grown since this was released in 2001 and become more skilled at creating well-rounded, nuanced characters. This story which centers around an opera singer at times feels like a stage production itself, moving scene to scene between characters in an omniscient 3rd person POV.

And at times it does feel a bit gimmicky and flat, the Peruvian setting never being named specifically for some reason and a bit of tone-deafness regarding Western 'exceptionalism' when it comes to art and culture. I think Patchett of 2025 would likely write things differently here (in fact, last year she published an annotated version of this with margin notes I'd love to take a look at some day to see if she agrees with my assessment).

All in all, her sentence level writing is so strong; her ability to tie themes and characters into the plot which is perfectly paced, for me at least and didn't drag like it did for some. While it has its flaws and might be my least favorite of her novels I've read so far, despite being her most acclaimed, I still admire Patchett's vision even when her reach exceeds her grasp.

This novel is a master class in how to write a really beautiful book that confuses the hell out of people and that they won't be able to explain to anyone.

4-4.25 stars

This book was a big surprise to me of how much I liked this audiobook. I've heard a lot about Ann Patchett and her books from my Goodreads friends. Many either love her books or find her works forgettable. There seems to be no in-between area with her novels, which meant that I had to give one of her books a shot to see where I land on the spectrum. This is my first time reading an Ann Patchett and it was a really nice experience. This is a slow paced plot so my friends who need action and constant changes or things occurring should avoid this book. For me, the slow pace gave me time to feel like I was in a dream where I could clearly picture the characters, the mansion and its scenery, and truly care about what happened to them all in the end. The epilogue doesn't really sit well with me so I'm going to try and forget about it.

I truly enjoyed this listening experience and think the audiobook is the best way to go when reading another Ann Patchett novel. In complete honesty, I'm not sure I would have been able to stick with just reading a print version of another slow paced plot. Sometimes you need a little extra something to keep the interest levels peaked.

I have no idea why this book is so popular. Incredibly dry and dull. Couldn't even finish it.

This was my third Patchett novel - I have also read the more recent Commonwealth and The Dutch House, and although I have great respect for her craft as a writer and her books are easy to read, I don't think she'll ever be a personal favourite writer. Like those books, this one has many endearing elements and is very well written, but for me the whole framing scenario was a little too implausible and romantic, and the ending a little too contrived.

How did Patchett do this? A seemingly horrifying event turned into a mystical one. Where lines of good vs evil are blurred. Where time is suspended.

It's a birthday party gala in South America. The guest of honour, a powerful Japanese figurehead, almost didn't make it himself except for the soprano whose voice he adores. As the final note is sung, the lights go out and the guerrillas enter. The party is hijacked for political reasons but what transpires during the next few months are the unusual relationships that are forged by the beauty of a voice which unites both terrorists and hostages. Where for long moments during this siege, captivity is interrupted and they are a group of people witnessing a main attraction, living it day to day.

Patchett is an artist. She details a portrait in which I bear witness. I searched arias and operas to get a sense of the beauty and passion this music can evoke. I'm in awe and for that I'm rating it a 4⭐️. I am smitten now with you, Patchett, but, I reserve the final star for the ending I wasn't as smitten with.