Dual role ... Ann Patchett is a writer and bookstore owner. Dual role ... Ann Patchett is a writer and bookstore owner. Photo: Melissa Ann Pinney

The best advertisement for Ann Patchett's new collection of non-fiction is anything else Patchett has written. Her novels (Bel Canto remains the most exquisite), memoir about a friend (Truth & Beauty) and assorted speeches and essays all share unusual frankness and drawing power. Patchett's style is not overly confessional, but it is beguiling in ways that make her sound like someone you'd want to know. Her new book, This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage, reinforces the impression of an uncommonly kind person who is not above self-interest but loves books, her grandmother, the toughest nun who taught her in grade school, her husband and her darling dog.

 Mush? Hardly. Patchett has had the courage to assemble both the hackish pieces she's written for Vogue, which do a sunny job of reinforcing what the reader wants to think, with freer, more soul-searching work from The Atlantic Monthly and Harper's. If these pieces were not identified by source, it would still be very easy to guess. But Patchett started writing magazine articles at an early age (''When Your Best Friend's a Guy''), and she nailed the tricks of that trade so well that they're worth showing off. In a long piece for Byliner, she shows off her accumulated prowess by delivering ''a veritable clearinghouse of practical advice''.
<i>This is The Story of a Happy Marriage</i>, by Ann Patchett.Crediting much of what she knows to the luck of the draw, which gave her Grace Paley, Allan Gurganus and Russell Banks as writing teachers, Patchett presents herself as something of a traditionalist.

  If you want to write, she says in The Getaway Car, sit down at your desk every day. Start with 20 minutes. Work up to two hours. ''During that time, you don't have to write, but you must stay at your desk without distraction: no phone, no internet, no books,'' she says. ''Sit still quietly. Do this for a week, for two weeks. Do not nap or check your email. Keep on sitting for as long as you remain interested in writing.'' And either you'll write or you'll quit. ''Either way,'' Patchett says, ''you'll have your answer.''

This is The Story of a Happy Marriage, by Ann Patchett. Bloomsbury.