The Magician's Assistant by Ann Patchett

 

Sabine's life changed forever that night when Parsifal, a magician, called her up from the audience to be his assistant.  She never looked back and for twenty years accompanied him all over the world.  She was madly in love with him and Parsifal loved her after a manner, but he was gay and the love of his life was Phan, a Vietnamese man who was wealthy from a software invention.  When the two men became ill with AIDS, Sabine moved in to take care of them both and after Phan died, Sabine and Parsifal married.

But it was a short marriage, less than a year.  After Parsifal's death, Sabine was left with a huge house, money and no idea what she would do for the rest of her life.  Parsifal had no family or so he had always said.  But when the will was read, Sabine was shocked to find that he had a mother and two sisters living in Nebraska.

Even more surprising was that the family wanted to meet her.  The mother and one sister came out to California.  Sabine took them around to various places she and Parsifal had frequented and she found out that Parsifal's family had loved him exceedingly even if he had left at seventeen and never returned.  After they left, Sabine agreed to come to Nebraska for one of the sister's wedding.  There she met the other sister and Parsifal's two nephews.  She learned the dark secrets of his life and began to figure out how she would move forward with her own.

This was Patchett's third novel.  It is full of the touchstones of her writing; human relationships that didn't go to plan but were what the individual had to work with.  Her characters are striving to learn what they need to have a happy life and loving someone is often the way forward.  Sabine has given her life to others but maybe it's time she got something for herself as well.  This book is recommended for readers of literary and women's fiction.