The New York Times bestselling author of State of Wonder and Bel Canto examines her deepest commitments: to writing, family, friends, dogs, books, and her husband. Together these essays, previously published in The Atlantic, Harper’s, Vogue, and The Washington Post, form a resonant portrait of a life lived with loyalty and with love.

Ann Patchett’s novels have been feats of imagination—from the tale of an opera singer held hostage inside a vice presidential mansion, to a forgotten tribe along the banks of the Amazon river—she has created entire worlds for the reader to inhabit.  Now, with her new book, she puts fiction aside and invites us into the very real world of her own life. This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage is both wide-ranging and deeply personal, overflowing with close observation and emotional wisdom. Stretching from her tumultuous childhood, from a disastro