Meet Ann Patchett: Award-Winning Author and Bookstore Champion
Award-winning author Ann Patchett will be honored with the Carl Sandburg Literary Award at the 2024 Chicago Public Library Foundation Awards!
Patchett is the author of nine critically acclaimed novels, including The Patron Saint of Liars, Taft, The Magician’s Assistant, Bel Canto, and #1 New York Times bestseller Tom Lake. She has received numerous accolades including the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Women’s Prize, and was featured as one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People. In 2021, Patchett was awarded the National Humanities Medal for “putting into words the beauty, pain, and complexity of human nature.”
In November 2011, she opened Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tennessee, with her business partner Karen Hayes. She has since become a spokesperson for independent booksellers, championing books and our freedom to read.
“Public libraries are a reminder of what our country is capable of being: welcoming, safe, and equal. All books are available to people. It’s a beautiful thing,” Patchett says.
What Ann is Reading
Ann is currently reading An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s by Doris Kearns Goodwin. In a blend of biography, memoir, and history, best-selling author and presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin chronicles her marriage to the late Richard Goodwin, who was a speechwriter for both Kennedy and Johnson, and reflects on the legacies of both presidents.
Books That Shaped Ann
When we asked Ann about the books that helped shape her, she said, “So many, but here are two.”
“Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White — it made me a vegetarian.
And recently, A Little Devil in America by Hanif Abdurraqib, because it taught me how to think about what an essay can do.”
More Good Stuff
Follow along with Parnassus Books on X, Instagram, and Facebook!
Subscribe to Ann’s blog, Notes from Ann, for book recommendations, exclusive commentary, articles, and more.
Watch previous Carl Sandburg Literary Award honorees like Judy Blume, George RR Martin, Isabel Wilkerson, Amy Tan, and Colson Whitehead.
