Deciding what audiobook to listen to requires its own special calculus, related to but distinct from the factors we consider when picking a book off a shelf. TOM LAKE, by Ann Patchett. Meryl Streep, who has lent her voice to audiobook renditions of Nora Ephron’s “Heartburn” and E.B. White’s “Charlotte’s Web,” is ideal for narrating “Tom Lake,” Ann Patchett’s sentimental new novel about a Midwestern family. And the plot of “Tom Lake” is organized around one woman who does just that: She tells her children an extended story.

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Persons: Ann Patchett, Read, Meryl Streep, Nora Ephron’s “, Tom Lake, ” Ann Patchett’s, Tom Lake ” Organizations: TOM