Books, Arts & Manners: Frankly, My Dear …

Independence Day, by Richard Ford (Knopf, 448 pp., $24)

IN several promising novels and a book of short stories, Richard Ford covered some ground, literally: Mississippi to Mexico to Montana. He really established his reputation as an up-and-coming heavy hitter, however, with The Sportswriter (1986), which introduced us to some characters and a setting that most book reviewers could more easily get with: writer Frank Bascombe, Frank’s soonto-be-ex-wife, Ann, and the town of Haddam, New Jersey. Now Bascombe is back, in a book hyped as what the Great American Novel would look like if such a thing were any longer possible. Could this be?

JR

About the Author

John Shelton Reed

Featured Tags

Manage following

Literature

Fiction

Independence Day, by Richard Ford (Knopf, 448 pp., $24)

IN several promising novels and a book of short stories, Richard Ford covered some ground, literally: Mississippi to Mexico to Montana. He really established his reputation as an up-and-coming heavy hitter, however, with The Sportswriter (1986), which introduced us to some characters and a setting that most book reviewers could more easily get with: writer Frank Bascombe, Frank’s soonto-be-ex-wife, Ann, and the town of Haddam, New Jersey. Now Bascombe is back, in a book hyped as what the Great American Novel would look like if such a thing were any longer possible. Could this be?