"Everyone in Elkins Park knew what went on in the Dutch House."  Did they? Well the narrator Danny and his sister Maeve didn't and although I know Patchett is a well respected writer I felt it was a long and tortured road to really find out.
The scene is set after their father Cyril Conroy establishes a large fortune in property development and decides to show his wealth by buying and restoring The Dutch House a magnificent property in the suburbs of Philadelphia.  There are the trappings of wealth but as ever the lack of love.  Their father is distant- in person and in parental care- although the scenes where Danny travels around in the car with his father collecting rents on a Saturday morning were perhaps for me the most emotional of the book. We are told their mother suddenly left but this is only much much later revealed in the denouement of the plot.
Maeve is the older sister, trying to care for Danny yet wanting to display her brilliance as an independent young woman whilst Danny is early on concerned that he might 'lose 'his main friend in life because of Maeve's diabetes and fragile health.
It seemed obvious that when their father brought in a new younger woman it was all going to unravel for the siblings and the novel highlights their continued yearning (by parking outside the house and hoping to be included in these new lives) as a tragic obstacle to them moving forward.
It is intricately written from the narrator's viewpoint (Danny) but I longed for more input from Fluffy (the Irish maid who it appears had a fling with their father) and the servants who are also expunged from the Dutch House as the new woman on the block Andrea takes charge.
It all comes to light too late for me.  
I can't doubt it is well written but I felt unconcerned about the main characters and felt I was stuck between the grandeur of lavish folly that was the building and the stark reality that became of the children.

I was still at the point in my life when the house was the hero of every story, our lost and beloved country.

It was apt that I read Ann Patchett’s latest novel, The Dutch House, while I was at McCrae. McCrae is the place where I’ve spent all of my summers. This year, I saw for the first time, the house that has been built where my family’s fibro beach shack once stood. When the shack was sold (I was devastated) people said to me, “It’s just a house, you still have the memories.” Logically, I knew this to be true but it didn’t explain why I continued to pass the house, seeing the unfamiliar cars in the driveway, and the new curtains hanging in the window, and always wondering, “Did ‘they’ love the house as much as I did?”

In The Dutch House, I found kindred spirits in siblings Maeve and Danny. The house in question is named for the nationality of its original owners, the Van Hoebeeks (although features Delft mantlepieces, a dining room with a deep blue and gilt ceiling, and a powder-room with carved walnut panels of birds and flowers). Danny describes the house as “…more in keeping with Versailles than Eastern Pennsylvania…” and as a child, found its opulence ‘mortifying’.

Danny and Maeve are forced to leave the Dutch House but, as adults, they frequently return, parking across the street, observing the house from a distance and reflecting on what had happened to them (I won’t give that part of the story away!) –

“…like swallows, like salmon, we were the helpless captives of our migratory patterns. We pretended that what we had lost was the house, not our mother, not our father. We pretended that what we had lost had been taken from us by the person who still lived inside…. 

It is during one of these visits that Danny asks Maeve whether she thought it was possible to ‘…ever see the past as it actually was.’ While Maeve insists that she does that, Danny is not so sure and proposes that we in fact ‘…overlay the present onto the past,’

“We look back through the lens of what we know now, so we’re not seeing it as the people we were, we’re seeing it as the people we are, and that means the past has been radically altered.”

So where does this leave me, and my memories of a far-from-opulent beach shack? I think I’m with Danny, and that my ‘past’ with the beach shack represents a carefree childhood; an endless summer; family; a life free of responsibility, timetables, and expectations – all seen though the far more burdened lens of the present.

I’ve said little about the plot of The Dutch House – I won’t go into specifics but know that the gentle twists and turns are absolute perfection.

Equally wonderful is the deliciously complex theme of motherhood, which Patchett magnifies by adding fairy tale elements to the story – the ‘wicked’ stepmother; the distant father; the fairy godmother; a red coat; life-saving elixirs; and the magical castle (and in the case of the Dutch House, its secret doors; curtains enclosing window-seats; a dark basement; and chests and wardrobes full of things that hadn’t been touched in decades). These narrative elements are familiar and yet Patchett incorporates them out in a way that is unexpected but nonetheless believable.

Mothers were the measure of safety, which meant that I was safer than Maeve. After our mother left, Maeve took up the job on my behalf but no one did the same for her.

5/5 I didn’t think I could love a story as much as I loved Commonwealth, but there you go, Patchett has done it again.

I received my copy of The Dutch House from the publisher, Bloomsbury Publishing ANZ, via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.

The place you grew up will always hold significant meaning, whether it's filled with happy memories, linked to sorrow or trauma, or a complicated combination. For Danny and Maeve Conway their house loomed larger than life. The 'Dutch House' is an exquisite, elegant, ornate house, the house which drove their mother away, the house which was taken over by their step-family, the house from which they were eventually exiled. 

Ann Patchett's latest novel uses this unique house to explore themes of family, memory, loss, grief and life itself. Told through the eyes of the self absorbed, often selfish and sometimes petulant Danny, we see the siblings as they navigate life from childhood through to their 50s. Elder sister Maeve is the most wonderfully drawn character - one of the best in modern literature. A portrait of her as a girl watches over the whole book, and throughout Maeve is simultaneously girlish and headstrong, but also always the responsible adult, taking care of her brother. 

The dysfunctional family relationships are tough to read about, but very well represented. Patchett expertly captures the hurt, resentment and grudges that can build over years, and also the way we look back on our personal histories. Memory and how we interpret the events of our lives is a huge and important theme of the book, and it is a perfect portrait of how the past catches up with us and how we dissect our memories and relationships. 

The storytelling is enchanting. Patchett creates a set of characters and circumstances that are surprisingly engaging because they are just outside of the everyday. When you strip back the plot it is almost mundane but the history of the characters become sensationalised through their own storytelling. It is wholly original, and the reader has no idea where this journey will take them.

What can I say about this book that hasn’t already been said? Intelligent, elegant, and a beautiful read which I’ve heartily been recommending to everyone.

This isn't a title about plot, it's about characters and most specifically sibling interation. They're not always likeable and come from a place of entitlement and privilege, but the whole tale just hangs together so well, it doesn't matter. A timeless new piece from a master of the modern novel.

I was drawn to the cover...who wouldn't be?!

This is a beautifully written book. The pace is slow, but it is one to savour and enjoy. The story centres around two siblings, Danny and Maeve Conroy, and their family home, and  explores the intricate ties and tensions between them, over a period of years. The characterisation and descriptions were wonderful and how I would love to visit the Dutch House! I can picture it as if I had lived there.

This was my first Ann Patchett bok and it definitely won't be my last. Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

NetGalley/Publisher review:

What a brilliant book - it must be read! Danny and his sister Maeve have such a strong bond of love for each other but for the house too that they share with the people who lived  there before in a strange compelling way. When their father brings home Andrea and her daughters their world changes - not for the better. It is so heart wrenching that I could barely carry on reading but it was worth it.

3.5★
“She leaned over to light her cigarette off the stove’s gas flame.

‘I wish you wouldn’t do that.’ What I meant to say was, You are my sister, my only relation. Do not put your face in the f*cking fire.

She straightened up and exhaled a long plume of smoke across the kitchen. ‘I’ve got it down now. I burned off my eyelashes at a party in the Village a couple of years ago. You only have to do that once.’”

She is Maeve Conroy, the older sister of Danny, the narrator. Both grew up in the Dutch House, built in eastern Pennsylvania in 1922 by a Dutch couple, long gone, and bought lock, stock and furnishings by their father, Cyril, in the late 1940s, before Danny was born.

“Seen from certain vantage points of distance, it appeared to float several inches above the hill it sat on. The panes of glass that surrounded the glass front doors were as big as storefront windows and held in place by wrought-iron vines.”

The children loved it. Their mother didn’t. Paintings of the Dutch couple, Mr. and Mrs. VanHoebeek (“Van-who-bake”), dominate the drawing room and a portrait of Maeve, at ten in her bright red coat, hangs on the opposite wall. That’s the cover of the book, which is great.

The story is told in a circular fashion. It opens with their father bringing home a woman, Andrea, to meet his children. Their mother had left, returned, left, returned, and finally left for good. The two servants, Sandy and Jocelyn, have been raising the children, who are comfortable with things the way they are. Maeve is fifteen, Danny, eight.

Andrea is obviously smitten with the grand house but seems less enthusiastic about Cyril’s children. Maeve is already a head taller than the tiny widow, and later, when they discover Andrea has two little girls, there is even less likelihood she will view them favourably.

”Though the story will be remembered that Maeve and Andrea were at odds right from the start, that wasn’t true. Maeve was perfectly fair and polite when they met, and she remained fair and polite until doing so was no longer possible.”

Cyril has become a successful property developer and Danny loves going with him to inspect buildings and building sites and collect the rents from tenants. He looks forward to taking over the company one day. He’s learning how to fix taps, patch cracks, work with his hands.

“’The only way to really understand what money means is to have been poor,’ he said to me when we were eating lunch in the car. ‘That’s the strike you have against you. A boy grows up rich like you, never wanting for anything, never being hungry’—he shook his head, as if it had been a disappointing choice I’d made—'I don’t know how a person overcomes a thing like that.’”

He loves his dad, but it’s Maeve who is the gravitational force around which he orbits. They are fiercely loyal to each other, an unbreakable unit against the world. Maeve manages his life.

I found Danny completely self-absorbed, worrying mostly about himself and Maeve, but taking little real interest in anyone else. He loves playing basketball with friends, but they aren’t part of the story.

It’s interesting to read about children growing up in post-war Pennsylvania and how a war veteran like their father managed to establish himself. It is not interesting to have scene after scene after scene of Maeve and Danny talking about the house and picking at the scabs on the wounds caused by Andrea, and before that, their mother’s disappearance.

It’s all about Danny, and I wasn’t that crazy about him. I understand the popular audio book is narrated by Tom Hanks. The voice in my head was a bit petulant sometimes, more like Steve Carell's character from the American version of The Office, when Maeve was talking Danny into something. [I must admit, I haven't heard the Hanks rendition, and he's such a good actor, I know he can complain as well as anyone. But he's better known for being likeable and smart.]

I lost interest as time went on. I found the strength of Maeve’s influence a bit much to swallow. I don’t want to give any spoilers, so I’ll just say that the alliances that formed later and the resolution of some of the relationships seemed to tie up the loose ends too neatly and unrealistically, for me.

But don’t take my word for it. This is a very popular book, and you may love it as so many others have. I enjoyed it enough to round up to four stars rather than down to three.

Thanks to NetGalley and Bloomsbury for the preview copy from which I’ve quoted.

I feel I must be one of the last reviewers to read this bestseller so I can only apologise for my tardiness! After all, The Dutch House was one of the biggest hits of 2019 and it isn’t even due out in paperback until May this year. So, this intrigued me as 2019 was packed with big name authors and return of familiar worlds and names – what was it about The Dutch House that was turning readers into evangelists?

First up, I must disclose that I read this in a day. All the way through. Yet this isn’t a thriller with a powerful narrative drive; rather, The Dutch House is a delicate family drama that reveals itself in both familiar and unsuspecting ways. And since I put the book down, I often find myself thinking about its themes of family, the power of a calling, regret, revenge and reckonings. And how big family dramas are often, more truthfully, to be found in the private turmoil of emotions rather than explosive confrontations.

Ann invites us into the world of Danny and Maeve, a brother and sister who live with their father in the titular mansion in Pennsylvania. Their mother has long since fled for reasons that remain unclear and, their father being emotionally unavailable, the two have formed an unshakeable bond between themselves and their household staff.

But the familiar is suddenly thrown into turmoil when their father brings home a new woman who, obsessed with the mansion, its paintings and its history, quickly ensures she becomes their stepmother. But this is a very contemporary evil stepmother and no sooner are her feet under the table then Maeve and Danny are pushed out. And this becomes emphatic and permanent when their father dies soon after and the pair are removed from the house and access to its fortune.

“…traditionally the first generation makes the money, the second generation spends the money, and the third generation has to go to work again. But in our case, out father made a fortune and then he blew it. He completed the entire cycle in his own lifetime. He was poor, then rich, and now we’re poor.”

What’s interesting in this is that the conclusion obviously has to be a reckoning; Maeve and Danny must at some point come full circle and confront this injustice. But this is a story that spans five decades. The passing of time affects this story profoundly – as it does in reality. Grievances come and go, people change. Their lives take them in new directions, new pressures and demands take our focus. And that is what Ann captures here. Her writing dances over the decades with ease – there is no drag or slog; instead we witness Maeve and Danny struggle to shrug off the shadows of childhood but also realise they cannot move forward until they find peace.

And that peace does finally come – but not in the way you expect. Because at the heart of this is the message that even when you think you get what you want, it may not be what you need. You’ve to look to yourself to find peace.

This is a beautiful book. Ann has drawn such interesting characters and the way she brings these characters together is so fascinating – how sometimes they seem to fit as a natural family, how it is clear at other times that they should never have been a family. (“God’s truth,” Maeve said. “Our father was a man who had never met his own wife.”) But it is her deft touch that marvels me most. By all account, this is an epic but it doesn’t feel like it; it is intimate rather than sweeping, and bittersweet rather than melodramatic.

Refreshing and interesting story although sad and frustrating.  Beautifully written and engaging and I enjoyed a setting that is largely unknown to me.

The Dutch House is a grand beautiful house on the outskirts of Philadelphia.  We learn all about the house and how it dominated the lives of Meave and Danny two siblings who grew up in the Dutch House.  At times I was reduced to tears, shouting at the characters not to do things.  Beautiful and sad.

Loved loved LOVED this book. Beautifully written and really good story line.  I also found the characters really interesting. Thank you netgalley for the chance to read this in return for a review.

Oh The Dutch House. I love you. It’s hard to put into words why. It wasn’t too sad. Because you learned the mom left at the beginning and don’t care for the dad, these didn’t really affect me. It was a huge comfort read. I loved Danny and Maeve and their sad orphan lives. How Danny just becomes a doctor because his sister wants him too in a weird vengence play. It was just so cosy in there. I loved that Maeve forgave her mom and couldn’t forgive her mom for helping her stepmother. That was just so infuriating, but showed who her mom really was. A martyr for everyone but her family. I liked the comfortable and easy relationship between Danny and Celeste and their kids. And just what The Dutch House means. I just loved it. There was a bit of magic here that I can’t put into words, no matter how hard I try.

Brilliantly written story about two siblings who are thrown out of Paradise (the exquisitely crafted Dutch House of the title), by their stepmother when their father dies. The house looms in the background of this family story as a symbol of  relationships, about disappointing parents, about moving on - or not - when bad things happen. The characters are beautifully drawn and this is a hugely enjoyable read.

Possibly the best book I've read this year. I re "read" it afterwards on audio with Tom Hanks. A wonderful family saga with deep characters and a meaningful story

This has to be one of my books of the year. Complex, heart felt and with such compelling and believable characters. There is a true sense of history and time developed within the novel. 
To call it a ‘family saga’ is to over simplify it’s reach  and skill,. And yet the organic way the characters develop is central to the novel.
A masterpiece

I'm amazed about how captivating this book was. Mainly the story goes around an atypical family with their ups and downs and yes.. an old House. 

The bond between siblings Maeve and Danny was so touching.  So many feels. 

Also I was impressed at how much rage I could feel at some point, and then life, and time with their healing power were displayed in a way almost impossible to deny.

My first Ann Patchett, and now I'll definitely will be checking her other books.

I absolutely loved this book. Ann Patchett is a writer who reveals the secrets of the human heart with such a fine scalpel you barely realise she's cut the skin. Here, the hearts she lays bare are those of Danny and Maeve, siblings whose childhood was marked by the ineradicable loss of their mother: not to death, although that's what their father would prefer them to believe, but to desertion. The question of why Elna should have walked away from the grand house on the outskirts of Philadelphia bought for her by her self-made husband , is one that her children spend the years of their adult lives trying to answer. Beautiful, brilliant, vengeful Maeve and her younger brother Danny cannot forget or forgive silly social-climber Andrea who arrived to take their mother's place in the house and in their father's affections.

Patchett sets up a pattern of skilful time-slips that gradually reveal the story of the siblings' lives as children and in adulthood; old hurts are nursed and carried into new relationships, time doesn't. necessarily heal, but as Danny slowly discovers more about himself and what happened in the past, a kind of resolution is achieved. This is a writer at the top of her game.

Clearly I have be late to the party. Prior to The Dutch House I had never read anything by Ann Patchett. I have been missing out on so much. What a fantastic author.
Here is a beautiful, moving book about anything and everything to do with love. But there are other aspects to betrayal, obsession, duty. The house has a life with it- it almost comes alive. It is beautifully written and intertwined within it.
Characters hold their own and are strong and well defined.
This is my first but not my last book written by Ann Patchett that I will be reading.
Thank you to both NetGalley and Bloomsbury Publishing for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my unbiased review

A childhood home, it’s daily life, tears, traumas, arguments and family relationships are at the heart of this story by Ann Patchett. The Dutch House was a step up for the Conroy family, their father a property developer adding it to his portfolio however by doing so he alienates his wife who is happy as she is. Danny and Maeve grow up with a missing parent until a step-mother arrives with two children in tow. Throughout their life the house influences decisions they make, their relationships and careers. Found myself rejecting on my own childhood home. 

Thank you to Netgalley the author and publishers for ARC of this book.