Tell me everything by Elizabeth Strout

Finding a new book by Elizabeth Strout is like receiving an invitation to some kind of reunion, because once you open the pages, old friends appear. There's Lucy Barton and Olive Kitteridge and good old Bob Burgess and before you know it you feel as though you'd never been away.

Olive has reached the grand old age of ninety one in this novel, and although she doesn't have the lead in this story, she still manages to make herself the most important character just by letting other people come and tell her things. Olive has heard that the novelist Lucy Barton has moved nearby, and knowing that she is a writer, Olive invites her to visit her in her retirement home to hear a story that may be of interest. Lucy is happy to come along and Olive is pleased to find that she seems genuinely interested in her story.

Not many people know how to properly listen to someone's story, but those that do ask questions to show they have absorbed the information and are keen to know more detail. Both Lucy and Olive have this ability and their shared stories of undocumented lives help them to understand each other and those closest to them.

Running in the background of this novel is a police investigation into who was responsible for the murder of an elderly woman whose body has been found in a nearby lake. This is a very serious matter but somehow it doesn't overwhelm all the tiny observations that reveal the complexity of human life. Elizabeth Strout is a master of capturing relationships and how they all interlock with one another. We have all felt the things the characters feel and that makes the book a shared space. Our internal reactions bond us to these old friends and having the chance to meet up again is a real joy.

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