Remembering Author Anita Shreve

Anita Shreve, the American author of 18 novels died on 29th March 2017.  I was saddened to read this, not because I knew her or even know anyone connected with her.  I knew nothing of who she was as person or what she did before she was an author or if she had a husband or partner or children, or even where she lived.

Shreve’s publisher described her as “a beloved figure for all of us who had the privilege of working with her”, calling her “both elegant and modest, kind, funny, and always observant of every nuance of human interaction”.

I obviously know nothing of this, but because I have enjoyed so many of her novels, I felt a connection with her. I had invested in her and been amply rewarded by the reading pleasure she had given me over the years.

Most readers will be able to recall authors whom throughout their lives have influenced their reading or have had special impact at a particular time in their lives. Authors who have selflessly delivered an abundant supply of joy each time one of their books was opened.  Like most readers I have a number of authors who fall into these categories, and Anita Shreve was, and still is very much one of them.

So what was it about Anita Shreve that appealed to me?  I have been mulling this over as I have read some of the recent obituaries in both the UK and USA press; and as I have perused the 12 novels by her which line my shelves!

I read Anita Shreve way before I ever read Anne Tyler, another author who I often refer to as a ‘favourite’ and as someone who has influenced my reading and perhaps even my ham fisted attempts at writing.  Anita Shreve was I think one of the first American female novelists I really read.  She added something to my reading which at the time was growing in its intensity and depth.  The Weight of Water was her first best seller in 1997 and I suspect it is around this time, in the early days of married life that I discovered her.

Anita Shreve wrote very well about marriage and relationships between men and women.  She had an eye for the detail and minutiae of relationships which I enjoy, and she wrote with an empathy and intensity which I came to love.  The Pilots Wife is perhaps the novel that stays with me most. A story about a woman who’s husband dies when he goes down with his plane.  He is exposed as having lived a fraudulent and secret life and the novel follows his wife’s attempts to discover the truth whatever the cost.  Anita Shreve writes about strong women and she writes about the shattering changes that can come about because of one single act or event. For quite some time during my adult life she was an author I would turn to when I wanted a guaranteed absorbing read.  I can confidently say, that over the years she has accompanied me on many holidays and train journeys, and she has kept me reading late into the night.

Relationships with authors, who chances are you will never meet is one of the pleasures of reading and a pleasure which I suspect a non reader might struggle to understand. I am thankful for Anita Shreve and for all she has added to my reading world because of her books.  Perhaps it is time to dust down one or two of the 12 novels that sit on the shelf in my hall, and reacquaint myself with an old friend.

Anita Shreve 7th October 1946 – 29th March 2018