Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award • Winner of the Orange Prize • National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist
“Bel Canto is its own universe. A marvel of a book.” —Washington Post Book World
New York Times bestselling author Ann Patchett’s spellbinding novel about love and opera, and the unifying ways people learn to communicate across cultural barriers in times of crisis
Somewhere in South … learn to communicate across cultural barriers in times of crisis
Somewhere in South America, at the home of the country’s vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honor of the powerful businessman Mr. Hosokawa. Roxanne Coss, opera’s most revered soprano, has mesmerized the international guests with her singing. It is a perfect evening—until a band of gun-wielding terrorists takes the entire party hostage. But what begins as a panicked, life-threatening scenario slowly evolves into something quite different, a moment of great beauty, as terrorists and hostages forge unexpected bonds and people from different continents become compatriots, intimate friends, and lovers.
Patchett’s lyrical prose and lucid imagination make Bel Canto a captivating story of strength and frailty, love and imprisonment, and an inspiring tale of transcendent romance.
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Anne Patchett writes wonderful stories.
Beautifully observed characters and relationship building under the pressure of a hostage situation.
I loved it! One of my all time favorite books.
I knew nothing about opera until I read this book which only uses opera as a background to the ensuing violence of a terrorist attack.
This is one book that I will always remember. The plot is simple at first with an inevitable conclusion but then the author applies Stockholm Syndrome to the story. You pray that their will be a different ending.
Typical Ann Patchett, well developed characters and an engaging story.
Loved it! Big fan of Ann Patchett.
I liked how your perspective changed as the story unfolded. No one in the group of characters could have predicted how they would react to the situation or realized that good things could come of it. I would say it is thought-provoking.
Not a fan, although others in my book club loved. I found it kind of histrionic and melodramatic and never really connected.
Our book club has read The Magician’s Assistant and Bel Canto by Ann Patchett and are wowed by her talent.
I did not like the way it ended.
a wonderful twist on an odd kidnapping in a foreign country. A love story between two foreigners who can only communicate thru their love of music.
Nice story but a bit long and sometimes drawn out.
The adjectives you offer hardly explain this magnificent book.The place, the plot line which includes opera…. Just as when I was a teen.. starting to love books.. you come to one where you want to pry open the back cover paper.. to see if there is more of the story there…. Just brilliant writing…
slow
Beautiful, beautiful work of art
This was the first book I read by Ann Patchett. After Bel Canto, I read all of Patchett’s books.
An absolutely marvelous book. Every page is filled with a different kind of suspense and familiar romance. Following each character and getting to know the terrorists as individuals instead of a collective group. This masterpiece allows you to live the differences between those of us who are wealthy and those who have nothing, defining the …
I enjoyed the book about the relationship developing between hostages and their captors. The book is exciting and sometimes touching. Although the end is known in advance and noted at the beginning of the book and I could live with it, but what irritated me is the epilogue which I found detached and refuted in light of everything that is told in …
I enjoyed this book, but it is a slow read.
One of my favorites!