Richard Ford

A Piece of My Heart by Richard Ford follows the journey of two men on separate quests that lead them to the same enigmatic location. Robard Hewes has driven across the country in search of a woman named Buena who, twelve years ago, infused him with a feeling that has now turned into obsession. Meanwhile, Sam Newel has travelled from...

A masterful writer - RAYMOND CARVER Over the course of four celebrated works of fiction and almost forty years, Richard Ford has crafted an ambitious, incisive and singular view of American life as lived. Unconstrained, astute, provocative, often laugh-out-loud funny, Frank Bascombe is, here, once more our guide to the great American midway. Now in the twilight of life, a...

‘The best novel out of America in many years, a funny, achingly sad account of a father’s disastrous outing with his son and much else besides … Simply, a masterpiece’ JOHN BANVILLE, GUARDIAN A FRANK BASCOMBE NOVEL It is the Fourth of July weekend, and we meet Frank Bascombe in the throes of what he calls his ‘Existence Period’ –...

‘A work of understated power, intelligence and not a little mischief’ INDEPENDENT ‘Funny, touching and profound’ FINANCIAL TIMES ‘Another seemingly effortless Ford masterpiece’ DAILY MAIL A FRANK BASCOMBE COLLECTION Christmas brings Frank Bascombe to the Default Period of his life. Now sixty-eight, Frank resides again in the New Jersey suburb of Haddam, and has thrived – seemingly but not utterly...

In these ten stories, Ford mines literary gold from the wind-scrubbed landscape of the American West—and from the guarded hopes and gnawing loneliness of the people who live there. A refugee from justice driving across Wyoming with his daughter, an unhappy girlfriend and a stolen Mercedes; a boy watching his family dissolve in a night of tragicomic violence; two men...

‘The god of small stories … A set of polished gems from a master craftsman’ Sunday Times ‘An American master’ Daily Telegraph A woman and man, parted a quarter of a century, reunite in a bar in New Orleans as the St Patrick’s Day parade goes by. A group of friends, all once promising, reunite for dinner when one of...

‘Marvellously subtle, moving and funny’ JOHN BANVILLE, OBSERVER ‘Wonderfully written in every breath of every sentence’ HERMIONE LEE, GUARDIAN ‘Wistful, bittersweet – and often very funny’ DAILY TELEGRAPH A FRANK BASCOMBE NOVEL It is approaching Thanksgiving weekend and Frank Bascombe has arrived at a state of optimistic pragmatism that he calls the ‘Permanent Period’ of life. Epic mistakes have already...

Frank Bascombe has a younger girlfriend and a job as a sportswriter. To many men of his age, thirty-eight, this would be a cause for optimism, yet Frank feels the pull of his inner despair and especially of his recent losses—his preferred career has ended, his wife has divorced him, and a tragic accident took his elder son. In the...

In this novel of menace and eroticism, Richard Ford updates the tradition of Conrad for the age of cocaine smuggling. The setting is Oaxaca, Mexico, where Harry Quinn has come to free his girlfriend's brother, Sonny, from jail and furthermore get him away from the suavely sadistic drug dealer who suspects Sonny of having cheated him.

LONGLISTED FOR THE GORDON BURN PRIZE 2017 From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sportswriter comes a deeply personal account of his parents—an intimate portrait of American mid-twentieth century life, and a celebration of family love. Edna Akin and Parker Ford married young. For fifteen years, they traveled the American south of the 1930s as Parker went about his work...

The landscape of Women with Men ranges from the northern plains of Montana to the streets of Paris and the suburbs of Chicago. The tragedies that stalk the characters are unfolded with an indelible wit and clarity. So merciless is Ford's lingering gaze upon human, mostly male, weakness, so understanding his eye for the unravelling threads of human love, that...

Richard Ford returns with four deftly linked Christmas stories narrated by the iconic Frank Bascombe. Now sixty-eight, Frank resides again in the New Jersey suburb of Haddam, and has thrived – seemingly but not utterly – amidst the devastations of Hurricane Sandy. The desolations of Sandy, which left countless lives unmoored, are the perfect backdrop for Ford – and Bascombe....

It is autumn, 2000, and Frank Bascombe has arrived at a state of optimistic pragmatism that he calls the Permanent Period of life. Epic mistakes have already been made, dreams downsized, and Frank reflects that now at least there are fewer opportunities left in life to get things wrong. But the tranquillity he anticipated is not to be. In fact,...

Frank Bascombe has a younger girlfriend and a job as a sportswriter. To many men of his age, thirty-eight, this would be a cause for optimism, yet Frank feels the pull of his inner despair and especially of his recent losses - his preferred career has ended, his wife has divorced him, and a tragic accident took his elder son....

A masterful writer - RAYMOND CARVER Over the course of four celebrated works of fiction and almost forty years, Richard Ford has crafted an ambitious, incisive, and singular view of American life as lived. Unconstrained, astute, provocative, and often laugh-out-loud funny, Frank Bascombe is, here, once more our guide to the great American midway. Now in the twilight of life,...

The setting is Great Falls, Montana, where the Rockies end and where, in 1960, the promise of good times seems as limitless as the sweep of the prairies beyond. This is where the Brinson family hopes to find a better life. Instead, sixteen-year-old Joe Brinson watches his parents discover the limits of their marriage and, at the same time, the...

More than 20 well-known writers and celebrities share the travel experiences that shaped their personalities and changed their lives. Contributors include Dave Eggers, Richard Ford, Pico Iyer, John Berendt, Alexander McCall Smith, and Jane Smiley. About Lonely Planet: Started in 1973, Lonely Planet has become the world’s leading travel guide publisher with guidebooks to every destination on the planet, as...