In this remarkable trilogy, Richard Ford creates one of the most enduring and empathetic characters in contemporary American fiction. When we meet Frank Bascombe in The Sportswriter, his unguarded voice instantly wins us over, drawing us into a life that has been irrevocably changed by the loss of a child, a marriage and a career. We then follow Frank, ever laconic and observant, through Independence Day and The Lay of the Land, witnessing his fortune’s rise and his family’s fragmentation and reintegration. With his finely honed prose and an eye that captures the most subtle nuances of the human condition in all its pathos, humour and strangeness, Richard Ford transforms an ordinary man’s life into a riveting parable of modern existence.