Empire Falls

Empire Falls won the Pulitzer Prize in 2002, and while it was a quiet novel, I enjoyed my journey with Miles,  Tick, and the rest of the eclectic cast of characters living in a dying town. Perhaps I enjoyed it because I came from a small town much like Empire Falls, a small community of people living out their existence without ever venturing beyond the city limits. Everyone has history with everyone, and past mistakes are hard to escape. At the heart, I think I enjoyed it most for the characters. In this novel, Richard Russo was able to capture the true essence of each individual, plopping you down in the middle of their world and slowly revealing glimpses of the past as the protagonist, Miles Roby makes sense of what his life has become.

Miles struggles with his divorce, caring for his daughter, and keeping the grill afloat, all under the watchful eye of Francine Whiting. Much like the Eye of Mordor, she sees and knows everything, making it hard for Miles to escape her clutches. However, it is not just Whiting that ties him to Empire Falls; Miles, himself, is innately unable to make a decision, to take control, allowing Whiting to pull the strings and driving his wife to the arms of another man.

While the book description promises hilarity, it is few and far between in these soul-searching pages. However, there is some comic relief in the form of one Silver Fox, the fiancee of Miles' ex-wife and a realtor in Empire Falls. The Silver Fox has commandeered Miles' old life, sleeping with is wife, living in his house, and invading the Empire Grill to salt the proverbial wound. While he is a character one immediately loves to hate, he is necessary to allow the reader to breath under the wait of something quiet but powerful.

I have been told by other avid readers that this is not the greatest of Russo's work, and that may very well be true. I have found on this Pulitzer journey that the committee sometimes misses the mark (in my humble opinion, of course), but I think Empire Falls offers up the life of a small blue-collar town trying to make it. From where I sit now in 2012, isn't that the new American dream? Just to make it?

Perhaps. I don't know. What I do know is that I find joy my daughter's innocence, in a hot cup of coffee and a good book, in a house full of people I love.

Up next The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck, winner of the 1932 Pulitzer Prize.

Until then, my friends.... Happy reading.