Most Popular Books by Richard Russo

In this droll, unsentimental, and occasionally hilarious novel, Richard Russotells the story of a big-hearted man who becomes the unlikely hero of a smalltown with a glorious past but a dubious future.

A Vintage Shorts Nonfiction Original One of the most valuable spaces for an artist is the inner life—the sacred place where, outside of the constraints of time and space, meaning is extracted from raw experience and fashioned into art. In this timely new essay, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Russo discusses the work writers do as they sift through experience and work to cultivate rich interior lives. For authors, this often involves performing triage, a constant assessment of events that helps determine what’s useful for a story and potentially enduring. But what is at stake when we perform triage? Is an artist’s interior life an act of generosity or selfishness? Reflecting on a year of reading and meditations on the nature of interiority brought up by a global pandemic and orders to stay at home, Triage is a candid and arresting look at the process that goes into creative work, by one of our most celebrated and bestselling novelists. An ebook short. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

A marvelous new essay collection from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Somebody''s Fool and The Destiny Thief Life and Art—these are the twin subjects considered in Richard Russo’s twelve masterful new essays—how they inform each other and how the stories we tell ourselves about both shape our understanding of the world around us. In “The Lives of Others,” he reflects on the implacable fact that writers use people, insisting that what matters, in the end, is how and for what purpose. How do you bridge the gap between what you know and what you don’t, and sometimes can’t, know? Why tell a story in the first place? What we don’t understand, Russo opines, is in fact the very thing that beckons to us. In “Stiff Neck,” he writes of the exasperating fault lines exposed within his own family as his wife’s sister and her husband—proudly unvaccinated—develop COVID. In “Triage,” he details with heartbreaking vividness the terror of seeing his seven-year-old grandson in critical condition. And in “Ghosts,” he revisits Gloversville, the town that gave rise to the now-legendary fictional town of North Bath, and confronts the specter of its richly populated past and its ghostly present. Sharp, tender, extraordinarily intimate reflections on work, culture, love, and family from one of the great writers of our time.

A NATIONAL BESTSELLER from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls • Three men in their late sixties—old friends from college, each with a secret—come together on Martha’s Vineyard in this “gripping, wise, and wonderful summer treat.” (The Boston Globe). “A cascade of charm…. Russo is an undeniably endearing writer, and chances are this story will draw you back to the most consequential moments in your own life.” —The Washington Post One beautiful September day, three men in their late sixties convene on Martha''s Vineyard, friends ever since meeting in college in the sixties. They couldn''t have been more different then, or even today—Lincoln''s a commercial real estate broker, Teddy a tiny-press publisher, and Mickey is a musician beyond his rockin'' age. But each man holds his own secrets, in addition to the monumental mystery that none of them has ever stopped puzzling over since a Memorial Day weekend right here on the Vineyard in 1971. Now, forty-five years later, three lives and that of a significant other are put on display while the distant past confounds the present in a relentless squall of surprise and discovery. Shot through with Russo''s trademark comedy and humanity, Chances Are . . . introduces a new level of suspense and menace that will quicken the reader''s heartbeat throughout this absorbing saga. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Empire Falls, this slyly funny, moving novel about a blue-collar town in upstate New York—and about Sully, one of its unluckiest citizens, who has been doing the wrong thing triumphantly for fifty years—is a classic American story. "Remarkable.... A revelation of the human heart." —The Washington Post Divorced from his own wife and carrying on halfheartedly with another man''s, saddled with a bum knee and friends who make enemies redundant, Sully now has one new problem to cope with: a long-estranged son who is in imminent danger of following in his father''s footsteps. With its uproarious humor and a heart that embraces humanity''s follies as well as its triumphs, Nobody''s Fool, from Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Richard Russo, is storytelling at its most generous. Nobody’s Fool was made into a movie starring Paul Newman, Bruce Willis, Jessica Tandy, and Melody Griffith. Look for Everybody’s Fool, available now, and Somebody’s Fool, coming soon.

Hilarious and true-to-life, witty, compassionate, and impossible to put down, Straight Man follows Hank Devereaux through one very bad week in this novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls. • Now the AMC Original Series Lucky Hank. William Henry Devereaux, Jr., is the reluctant chairman of the English department of a badly underfunded college in the Pennsylvania rust belt. Devereaux''s reluctance is partly rooted in his character—he is a born anarchist—and partly in the fact that his department is more savagely divided than the Balkans. In the course of a single week, Devereaux will have his nose mangled by an angry colleague, imagine his wife is having an affair with his dean, wonder if a curvaceous adjunct is trying to seduce him with peach pits, and threaten to execute a goose on local television. All this while coming to terms with his philandering father, the dereliction of his youthful promise, and the ominous failure of certain vital body functions. In short, Straight Man is classic Russo—side-splitting, poignant, compassionate, and unforgettable. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls delivers his most intimate novel yet: "An astute portrait of a 30-year marriage, in all its promise and pain…. His honest, heartfelt storytelling—like a cooling breeze off a certain New England shoreline—has never felt fresher" (People). For Griffin, all paths, all memories, converge at Cape Cod. The Cape is where he took his childhood summer vacations, where he and his wife, Joy, honeymooned, where they decided he’d leave his LA screenwriting job to become a college professor, and where they celebrated the marriage of their daughter Laura’s best friend. But when their beloved Laura’s wedding takes place a year later, Griffin is caught between chauffeuring his mother’s and father’s ashes in two urns and contending with Joy and her large, unruly family. Both he and she have also brought dates along. How in the world could this have happened? By turns hilarious, rueful, and uplifting, That Old Cape Magic is a profoundly involving novel about marriage, family, and all the other ties that bind. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls comes a wonderfully written novel about a small town in New York whose citizens have fallen on hard times. "Immensely readable and sympathetic.... Mr. Russo has an instinctive gift for capturing the rhythms of small-town life." —The New York Times Mohawk, New York, is one of those small towns that lie almost entirely on the wrong side of the tracks. Dallas Younger, a star athlete in high school, now drifts from tavern to poker game, losing money, and, inevitably, another set of false teeth. His ex-wife, Anne, is stuck in a losing battle with her mother over the care of her sick father. And their son, Randall, is deliberately neglecting his school work—because in a place like Mohawk it doesn''t pay to be too smart. In Mohawk, Russo explores these lives with profound compassion and flint-hard wit. Out of derailed ambitions and old loves, secret hatreds and communal myths, he has created a richly plotted, densely populated, and wonderfully written novel that captures every nuance of America''s backyard. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Empire Falls returns to North Bath, in upstate New York, and to the characters that captured the hearts and imaginations of millions of readers in his beloved best sellers Nobody’s Fool and Everybody’s Fool. “Sumptuous, spirited . . . [Russo] paints a shining fresco of a working-class community...” —The New York Times • "Another instant classic, filled with Russo''s witty dialogue and warm understanding of human foibles." —People Magazine Ten years after the death of the magnetic Donald “Sully” Sullivan, the town of North Bath is going through a major transition as it is annexed by its much wealthier neighbor, Schuyler Springs. Peter, Sully’s son, is still grappling with his father’s tremendous legacy as well as his relationship to his own son, Thomas, wondering if he has been all that different a father than Sully was to him. Meanwhile, the towns’ newly consolidated police department falls into the hands of Charice Bond, after the resignation of Doug Raymer, the former North Bath police chief and Charice’s ex-lover. When a decomposing body turns up in the abandoned hotel situated between the two towns, Charice and Raymer are drawn together again and forced to address their complicated attraction to one another. Across town, Ruth, Sully’s married ex-lover, and her daughter Janey struggle to understand Janey’s daughter, Tina, and her growing obsession with Peter’s other son, Will. Amidst the turmoil, the town’s residents speculate on the identity of the unidentified body, and wonder who among their number could have disappeared unnoticed. Infused with all the wry humor and shrewd observations that Russo is known for, Somebody''s Fool is another classic from a modern master.

A Vintage Shorts Short Story original. David and Ellie didn’t realize how much they have missed their friends, two other couples who had moved out of their modest neighborhood in a desert city for the comforts of the suburbs, until the day of Donald Trump’s election. Separated also from their daughter who lived hours away in California, they were in a funk. But, when Ellie discovers a repellant offering floating in the small Jacuzzi in their backyard, David is blindsided. Little does he know this is but the first in a chain of grisly events that would play out in their lives with devastating consequences. In this darkly humorous, incisive and absorbing political parable, written with the remarkable humanity he’s beloved for with countless fans, Pulitzer Prize-winner Richard Russo probes how deeply, yet imperceptibly, fissures can form amongst friends, neighbors, and families. An ebook short. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Empire Falls returns to North Bath, the Rust Belt town first brought to unforgettable life in Nobody’s Fool. • "Irresistible.... Very funny.... A joy." —The New York Times Now, ten years later, Doug Raymer has become the chief of police and is tormented by the improbable death of his wife—not to mention his suspicion that he was a failure of a husband. Meanwhile, the irrepressible Sully has come into a small fortune, but is suddenly faced with a VA cardiologist’s estimate that he only has a year or two left to live. As Sully frantically works to keep the bad news from the important people in his life, we are reunited with his son and grandson . . . with Ruth, the married woman with whom he carried on for years . . . and with the hapless Rub Squeers, who worries that he and Sully aren’t still best friends. Filled with humor, heart, and hard-luck characters you can’t help but love, Everybody’s Fool is a crowning achievement from one of the great storytellers of our time. Look for Nobody''s Fool, available now, and Somebody’s Fool, coming soon.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the beloved Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls comes "a magnificent, bighearted” novel (The Boston Globe) about small-town America that follows Louis Charles Lynch (“Lucy”) and his wife of forty years as they prepare to embark on a vacation to Italy. Lucy is sixty years old and has spent his entire life in Thomaston, New York. Like his late, beloved father, Lucy is an optimist, though he’s had plenty of reasons not to be—chief among them his mother, still indomitably alive. Yet it was her shrewdness, combined with that Lynch optimism, that had propelled them years ago to the right side of the tracks and created an “empire” of convenience stores about to be passed on to the next generation. Lucy''s oldest friend, once a rival for his wife''s affection, leads a life in Venice far removed from Thomaston. In fact, the exact nature of their friendship is one of the many mysteries Lucy hopes to untangle in the “history” he’s writing of his hometown and family. And with his story interspersed with that of Noonan, the native son who’d fled so long ago, the destinies building up around both of them (and Sarah, too) are relentless, constantly surprising, and utterly revealing.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls turns to memoir in this "intimate and powerful" account (Chicago Tribune) of his lifelong bond with his high-strung, spirited mother—and the small town she spent her life trying to escape. Anyone familiar with Russo’s novels will recognize Gloversville—once famous for producing nine out of ten dress gloves in the United States. By the time Rick was born, ladies had stopped wearing gloves and Gloversville was on its way out. Jean Russo instilled in her son her dream of a better life elsewhere, a dream that prompted her to follow him across the country when he went to college. Their adventures and tribulations on that road trip were a preview of the hold his mother would continue to have on him as she kept trying desperately to change her life. Recounted with a clear-eyed mix of regret, nostalgia, and love, Elsewhere is a stirring tribute to the tenacious grip of the past. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls comes a wonderfully funny novel set in Mohawk, New York, where Ned Hall is doing his best to grow up, even though neither of his estranged parents can properly be called adult. "Superbly original and maliciously funny." —The New York Times Book Review His father, Sam, cultivates bad habits so assiduously that he is stuck at the bottom of his auto insurance risk pool. His mother, Jenny, is slowly going crazy from resentment at a husband who refuses either to stay or to stay away. As Ned veers between allegiances to these grossly inadequate role models, Richard Russo gives us a book that overflows with outsized characters and outlandish predicaments and whose vision of family is at once irreverent and unexpectedly moving. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

This irresistible collection of short stories from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls reveals the imperfect bargains of marriage, the discoveries and disillusionments of childhood, and the unwinnable battles men and women insist on fighting with the past. “An author whose laid-back understatements can be as sharp as other writers’ boldest declarations….the architect of stories you can’t put down.” —The New York Times Richard Russo brings the same bittersweet wit, deep knowledge of human nature, and spellbinding narrative gifts that distinguish his best-selling novels. A cynical Hollywood moviemaker confronts his dead wife’s lover and abruptly realizes the depth of his own passion. As his parents’ marriage disintegrates, a precocious fifth-grader distracts himself with meditations on baseball, spaghetti, and his place in the universe. And in the title story, an elderly nun enters a college creative writing class and plays havoc with its tidy notions of fact and fiction. The Whore’s Child is further proof that Russo is one of the finest writers we have, unsparingly truthful yet hugely compassionate and capable of creating characters real that they seem to step off the page. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

In this “admirable…wry, idiosyncratic, vulnerably bighearted” collection (The New York Times Book Review), the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls powerfully considers the unexpected turns of the creative life and reveals the inner workings of one of America’s most beloved authors. “I’ve written a lot about destiny in my fiction,” admits Richard Russo, “not because I understand it, but because I’d like to.” In the first of these eleven remarkable essays, Russo shares the story of his onetime fiction workshop classmate who, of the two of them, was considered the class star, bound for literary glory. Yet it was Russo who emerged as a major writer. How, he wonders, did he manage to steal his classmate’s destiny? What twists of talent and fate determine a would-be writer’s path? In each of the pieces collected here, Russo considers the unexpected turns of the creative life. From his grandfather’s years cutting gloves to his own teenage dreams of rock stardom; from his first college teaching jobs to his dazzling reads of Dickens and Twain; from the roots of his famous novels to his journey accompanying a dear friend—the writer Jennifer Finney Boylan—as she pursued gender reassignment surgery, The Destiny Thief powerfully reveals the inner workings of one of America’s most beloved authors. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

A collection of short fiction explores the lives of a variety of characters, including a jaded Hollywood filmmaker, a precocious fifth-grader watching his parents'' marriage disintegrate, and a child forced into a harrowing cross-country escape.

"In this pair of novellas and two stories, Russo''s characters bear little similarity to the blue-collar citizens we''re familiar with from most of his novels. In "Horseman," a tenured professor confronts a young plagiarist as well as her own weaknesses as the Thanksgiving holiday approaches--"And after that, who knew?" In "Intervention," a realtor facing an ominous medical prognosis finds himself in his father''s shadow while he presses forward, or not. In "Voice," a semi-retired English professor is conned by his increasingly estranged brother into coming along on a group tour of the Biennale, fleeing a mortifying incident with a traumatized student back in Massachusetts but encountering further complications en route. And in "Milton and Marcus," a lapsed novelist is struggling with his wife''s illness and trying to rekindle his screenwriting career, only to be stymied by the pratfalls of that trade when he''s called to an aging, iconic star''s mountaintop in Wyoming"--

''"Whoever said beggars can''t be choosers," my grandfather would remark when she was out of earshot, "never met your mother."'' Jean Russo was a single mother in the 1950s, badly paid and living with her only son, Richard, in the upstairs apartment of her parents'' home on Helwig Street in Gloversville, New York. When Richard left for University, Jean saw her chance to escape a dead-end town in search of a better life elsewhere. So began a series of ill-conceived adventures, as ambitious son and restless mother strove to find somewhere to belong. Hilarious and heartbreaking, a story of growing up and of growing old, of becoming a man whilst remaining a son, of thinking that the grass is greener somewhere else, but knowing that going home is inevitable: On Helwig Street is a poignant tribute to a complicated mother and a brilliant evocation of mid-century America.

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A provocative, unprecedented anthology featuring original short stories on what it means to be an American from thirty bestselling and award-winning authors with an introduction by Pulitzer Prize–winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen: “This chorus of brilliant voices articulating the shape and texture of contemporary America makes for necessary reading” (Lauren Groff, author of Fates and Furies). When Donald Trump claimed victory in the November 2016 election, the US literary and art world erupted in indignation. Many of America’s preeminent writers and artists are stridently opposed to the administration’s agenda and executive orders—and they’re not about to go gentle into that good night. In this “masterful literary achievement” (Kurt Eichenwald, author of Conspiracy of Fools), more than thirty of the most acclaimed writers at work today consider the fundamental ideals of a free, just, and compassionate democracy through fiction in an anthology that “promises to be both a powerful tool in the fight to uphold our values and a tribute to the remarkable voices behind it” (Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU). With an introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and edited by bestselling author Jonathan Santlofer, this powerful anthology includes original, striking art from fourteen of the country’s most celebrated artists, cartoonists, and graphic novelists, including Art Spiegelman, Roz Chast, Marilyn Minter, and Eric Fischl. Transcendent, urgent, and ultimately hopeful, It Occurs to Me That I Am America takes back the narrative of what it means to be an American in the 21st century.

Maine is a place that inspires lifelong devotion in visitors and residents alike. It is a place that encompasses many worlds within its boundaries--mountains and lakes, rivers and forests, a dramatic coastline--and supports a unique way of life influenced by both geography and climate. Maine: The Seasons captures the rugged beauty and spirit of Maine by taking us into its very heart, through images and words. Featuring 127 color photographs by acclaimed landscape photographer Terrell S. Lester, and original essays by four celebrated writers--Elizabeth Strout on spring, Ann Beattie on summer, Richard Russo on autumn, and Richard Ford on winter--Maine: The Seasons gives us a richly evocative, visually glorious appreciation of the look, the feeling, the essence, of Maine.

A Vintage Shorts “Short Story Month” Selection As his parents’ marriage disintegrates, a precocious if distracted fifth-grader starts to daydream about baseball, spaghetti, and his place in the universe. Pulitzer Prize-winning Richard Russo is one of America’s finest writers, and here, truthfully and with compassion, he unwinds the slow disillusionment of childhood. A selection from Russo’s tenderhearted collection of short stories, The Whore’s Child. An ebook short. Look for Richard Russo''s new book, Somebody''s Fool, coming soon.

"From the Pulitzer Prize-winning Richard Russo--in his first stand-alone novel in a decade--comes a new revelation: a gripping story about the abiding yet complex power of friendship. One beautiful September day, three sixty-six-year old men convene on Martha''s Vineyard, friends ever since meeting in college circa the sixties. They couldn''t have been more different then, or even today--Lincoln''s a commercial real estate broker, Teddy a tiny-press publisher, and Mickey a musician beyond his rockin'' age. But each man holds his own secrets, in addition to the monumental mystery that none of them has ever stopped puzzling over since a Memorial Day weekend right here on the Vineyard in 1971. Now, more than forty years later, as this new weekend unfolds, three lives and that of a significant other are displayed in their entirety while the distant past confounds the present like a relentless squall of surprise and discovery. Shot through with Russo''s trademark comedy and humanity, Chances Are... also introduces a new level of suspense and menace that will quicken the reader''s heartbeat throughout this absorbing saga of how friendship''s bonds are every bit as constricting and rewarding as those of family or any other community. For both longtime fans and lucky newcomers, Chances Are... is a stunning demonstration of a highly acclaimed author deepening and expanding his remarkable achievement"-- Provided by publisher.