Louise Erdrich and Ann Patchett discuss The Sentence

Filmed November 9, 2021
Parnassus Books and HarperCollins are proud to present Louise Erdrich discussing her new book, The Sentence, in conversation with Ann Patchett.
About the Book
In this stunning and timely novel, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich creates a wickedly funny ghost story, a tale of passion, of a complex marriage, and of a woman's relentless errors.
Louise Erdrich's latest novel, The Sentence, asks what we owe to the living, the dead, to the reader and to the book. A small independent bookstore in Minneapolis is haunted from November 2019 to November 2020 by the store's most annoying customer. Flora dies on All Souls' Day, but she simply won't leave the store. Tookie, who has landed a job selling books after years of incarceration that she survived by reading with murderous attention, must solve the mystery of this haunting while at the same time trying to understand all that occurs in Minneapolis during a year of grief, astonishment, isolation, and furious reckoning.
The Sentence begins on All Souls' Day 2019 and ends on All Souls' Day 2020. Its mystery and proliferating ghost stories during this one year propel a narrative as rich, emotional, and profound as anything Louise Erdrich has written.
About the Author
Louise Erdrich, a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, is the author of many novels as well as volumes of poetry, children's books, and a memoir of early motherhood. Her novel The Round House won the National Book Award for Fiction. Love Medicine and LaRose received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction. Erdrich lives in Minnesota with her daughters and is the owner of Birchbark Books, a small independent bookstore. Her most recent book, The Night Watchman, won the Pulitzer Prize. A ghost lives in her creaky old house.

[@BobMacNeal]

Delighted to learn two of my favorite contemporary authors are good friends. I highly recommend The Sentence.

[@anniepais700]

Loved this awesome interview!!

[@jaylamartin2214]

Wow what a regal beautiful woman!!! Louise Erdrich!!!

[@renerev5520]

Wow, two fabulous authors, both small book store owners. Timely and poignant! I was initially concerned when I started the book and learned of the crime. I stopped reading for so many look ups, in a good way. I thoroughly enjoyed "The Sentence" as did our other book club members.

[@mairianncullen8753]

Really enjoyed this interview. (Also the book!) Please could you list the other recommened books in the description, as it was hard to catch some of the titles and authors.

[@mban11]

The NPR interviews are much better

[@susanpena7575]

No, they're not!

[@kathrynneeson3580]

Slow,down you talk too fast

[@commanderthorkilj.amundsen3426]

Louise has written intriguing books in the past. Her latest effort, however, sacrifices deep characters and story for an excuse to pound home tiresome issues of imagined systemic gracism and is a prolonged sermon. She often makes note of her Native American heritage (1/4th) but was raised Catholic by parents who were both teachers; she attended university and was never raised on a reservation. She’d do well to research Tony Timpa’s case (identical to George Floydd but wasn’t a violent criminal, and wasn’t black) but like many Non-blacck victims, received no media coverage. The continued stream of authors jumping on this virtue train grows tiresome.