Empire Falls -- Richard Russo, Paperback

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize

"Russo writes with a warm, vibrant humanity.... A stirring mix of poignancy, drama and comedy." --The Washington Post

Welcome to Empire Falls, a blue-collar town full of abandoned mills whose citizens surround themselves with the comforts and feuds provided by lifelong friends and neighbors and who find humor and hope in the most unlikely places, in this Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Richard Russo.

Miles Roby has been slinging burgers at the Empire Grill for 20 years, a job that cost him his college education and much of his self-respect. What keeps him there? It could be his bright, sensitive daughter Tick, who needs all his help surviving the local high school. Or maybe it's Janine, Miles' soon-to-be ex-wife, who's taken up with a noxiously vain health-club proprietor. Or perhaps it's the imperious Francine Whiting, who owns everything in town-and seems to believe that "everything" includes Miles himself. In Empire Falls Richard Russo delves deep into the blue-collar heart of America in a work that overflows with hilarity, heartache, and grace.

Author: Richard Russo
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 04/12/2002
Pages: 496
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.80lbs
Size: 8.00h x 5.40w x 1.00d
ISBN: 9780375726408

Accelerated Reader:
Reading Level: 7.4
Point Value: 34
Interest Level: Upper Grade
Quiz #/Name: 105691 / Empire Falls


Review Citation(s):
BookPage 05/01/2002 pg. 25
New York Times 05/26/2002 pg. 20
Commonweal 12/06/2002 pg. 25
Commonweal 06/20/2003 pg. 26
Booksense '76 Reading Grp 04 05/01/2004 pg. 1
Entertainment Weekly 09/04/2015 pg. 44

About the Author

Richard Russo is the author of eight novels; two collections of stories; and Elsewhere, a memoir. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which like Nobody's Fool was adapted to film, in a multiple-award-winning HBO miniseries.