The Risk Pool

by Richard Russo

Overview

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.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780679753834
Publisher:	Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/12/1994
Series:	Vintage Contemporaries
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	496
Sales rank:	177,391
Product dimensions:	5.17(w) x 7.94(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

RICHARD RUSSO is the author of nine novels, most recently Chances Are..., Everybody’s Fool and That Old Cape Magic; two collections of stories; and the memoir Elsewhere. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which, like Nobody’s Fool, was adapted into a multiple-award-winning miniseries; in 2017, he received France’s Grand Prix de Littérature Américaine. He lives in Port­land, Maine.

Hometown:

Gloversville, New York

Date of Birth:

July 15, 1949

Place of Birth:

Johnstown, New York

Education:

B.A., University of Arizona, 1967; Ph.D., University of Arizona, 1979; M.F.A., University of Arizona, 1980

Editorial Reviews

"Russo proves himself a master at evoking the sights, feelings, and smells of a town.... [The Risk Pool is] superbly original and maliciously funny." —The New York Times Book Review

"A fine, closely observed novel ... Richard Russo writes with such sympathy and attention to the rhythms of small-town life that he invests inarticulate lives with genuine passion.... [He] has succeeded in creating characters with the emotional weight of people we've known in real life." —The New York Times

"Weighted with wonderful detail ... a rich, anecdotal novel brimming with the metaphorical lessons of adolescence: on pocket billiards and sexual frustration, trout fishing and serenity." —The Boston Globe

"Richard Russo has it just perfect in The Risk Pool. A gem of a novel." —St. Louis Post-Dispatch

From the Publisher

``Brilliantly fulfilling the promise of his first novel, Mohawk , Russo's ``richly satisfying narrative'' is about the coming-of-age of Ned Hall, son of Sam Hall--a disreputable barfly, petty thief and gambler whose wicked ways place him at the lower end of the insurance risk pool. PW called the author's prose style ``as seductive as spring.'' (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

A story of not-so-successful folk in a decaying town in New York as seen through the eyes of Ned Hall, better known as ``Sam's son.'' Sam was once an average citizen who grew up, married, and went off to fight in World War II but returned a drifter. Leaving his wife and small son at home, he would haunt the bars and pool halls and hobnob with his cronies. Now and then he'd appear from nowhere to take Ned with him. When Ned's mother, Jenny, trips over the edge, Ned goes to live with Sam in a dilapidated loft above the town's one department store and shares his father's roguish life. Ned's 20-year story is filled with wonderfully drawn characters and hilarious adventures but the subtext is one of sadness and near desperation. Highly recommended. Marion Hanscom, SUNY at Binghamton Lib.

Library Journal