Ask Bookie
Whistler
Other Available Formats
Overview
Click here for the Autographed copy
The acclaimed, prize-winning #1 New York Times bestselling writer returns with a moving, luminous novel that reminds us of the sweetness and impermanence of life and the power of connection to defy time.
When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now fifty-three, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives. Meeting again, time falls away; while their relationship was brief, it had a profound impact on them both, and now that they are reunited, they have no intention of ever being separated again.
Whistler is a story about two adults looking back over the choices they made, and the choices that were made for them. It’s a story about bravery, memory, the often small yet consequential moments that define our lives, and the endless stream of loss that in time comes for us all. Beautiful in its simplicity, it is ultimately about how love endures, and how the feeling of being known by one other person, even for a short period of time, can change everything.
Customers Also Bought
- 1
Details
- ISBN-13: 9780063511637
- ISBN-10: 0063511630
- Publisher: Harper
- Publish Date: June 2026
- Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1.3 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.15 pounds
- Page Count: 304
Related Categories
You May Also Like...
- 1
The great Ann Patchett’s 10th novel, Whistler, will surprise you not just once but several times—but Patchett’s surprises are as sad as they are pleasurable. Most of Whistler’s characters, after all, are at an age when the wistful backward glance is a thing. One of the younger characters, and the sometime narrator of the book, is Daphne Fuller. When Whistler opens she’s in her 50s, a teacher at a tony girls' school and married to the somewhat older Jonathan. Indeed, everyone in the book is well-heeled, with their domiciles in Bronxville, New York, the now gentrified Chelsea area of Manhattan or Darien, Connecticut. We meet Daphne and Jonathan as they stroll around the Metropolitan Museum of Art and run into her long-lost stepfather, Eddie Triplett. Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie since her mother banished him decades ago. Their delight in the reunion is mutual. Daphne and Eddie’s relationship is Patchett’s first surprise. They were very close when Daphne was a child. A reader could be forgiven for thinking that something unsavory about this relationship is going to pop up somewhere along the line. But Eddie is as close to a saint as one can find in a contemporary work of fiction. He and Daphne simply fall back into loving each other, deeply, as father and daughter. Yet, there is shared darkness in their past. When Daphne was 9, something happened that forced the two of them into an excruciating intimacy. One snowy night, she and Eddie were in an accident after driving back home from a hospital visit. Their car flipped on its side, both were injured and they spent the night huddled beneath a blanket packed by Daphne’s biological dad. To soothe both of them, Eddie tells the story of a woman named Mary, who was also in a bad accident, and her trusty horse, Whistler. So why is the book named after this horse? Perhaps it has something to do with the adage that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Perhaps it’s a reminder that people in your life may cause you pain but you love them, and they love you in their own screwy way, and that’s enough. Whistler is exceptional.
The great Ann Patchett’s 10th novel, Whistler, will surprise you not just once but several times—but Patchett’s surprises are as sad as they are pleasurable. Most of Whistler’s characters, after all, are at an age when the wistful backward glance is a thing. One of the younger characters, and the sometime narrator of the book, is Daphne Fuller. When Whistler opens she’s in her 50s, a teacher at a tony girls' school and married to the somewhat older Jonathan. Indeed, everyone in the book is well-heeled, with their domiciles in Bronxville, New York, the now gentrified Chelsea area of Manhattan or Darien, Connecticut. We meet Daphne and Jonathan as they stroll around the Metropolitan Museum of Art and run into her long-lost stepfather, Eddie Triplett. Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie since her mother banished him decades ago. Their delight in the reunion is mutual. Daphne and Eddie’s relationship is Patchett’s first surprise. They were very close when Daphne was a child. A reader could be forgiven for thinking that something unsavory about this relationship is going to pop up somewhere along the line. But Eddie is as close to a saint as one can find in a contemporary work of fiction. He and Daphne simply fall back into loving each other, deeply, as father and daughter. Yet, there is shared darkness in their past. When Daphne was 9, something happened that forced the two of them into an excruciating intimacy. One snowy night, she and Eddie were in an accident after driving back home from a hospital visit. Their car flipped on its side, both were injured and they spent the night huddled beneath a blanket packed by Daphne’s biological dad. To soothe both of them, Eddie tells the story of a woman named Mary, who was also in a bad accident, and her trusty horse, Whistler. So why is the book named after this horse? Perhaps it has something to do with the adage that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Perhaps it’s a reminder that people in your life may cause you pain but you love them, and they love you in their own screwy way, and that’s enough. Whistler is exceptional.