Click to receive personalized book recommendations daily.
Before you go...
Check Out These
21 Books You’ve Been Meaning to Read
See the List
Best Seller
Everybody's Fool by Richard Russo
Read An Excerpt

Look Inside | Reading Guide

Read An Excerpt
Read An Excerpt
Read An Excerpt
Read An Excerpt

Everybody’s Fool

A Novel

A novel

A novel

A novel

A novel

By Richard Russo
On Tour

By Richard Russo
On Tour

By Richard Russo
On Tour

By Richard Russo
On Tour

By Richard Russo
On Tour

By Richard Russo
On Tour

By Richard Russo
On Tour

Read by Mark Bramhall

By Richard Russo
On Tour

Read by Mark Bramhall

By Richard Russo
On Tour

Read by Mark Bramhall

By Richard Russo
On Tour

Read by Mark Bramhall

Part of Vintage Contemporaries

Paperback $16.95

Jan 24, 2017 | 544 Pages

Paperback $28.00

May 03, 2016 | 720 Pages

Ebook $11.99

May 03, 2016 | 496 Pages

CD $55.00

May 03, 2016 | 1140 Minutes

Audiobook Download $27.50

May 03, 2016 | 1133 Minutes

All Formats
+
    Everybody's Fool by Richard Russo
    Paperback
    Jan 24, 2017 | 544 Pages
    See All Formats (4) +

    Paperback (2)
    –

    • Paperback $16.95

      Jan 24, 2017 | 544 Pages

    • Paperback $28.00

      May 03, 2016 | 720 Pages

    Ebook
    +

    • Ebook $11.99

      May 03, 2016 | 496 Pages

    Audio (2)
    +

    • CD $55.00

      May 03, 2016 | 1140 Minutes

    • Audiobook Download $27.50

      May 03, 2016 | 1133 Minutes

    Buy the Audiobook Download:

    About Everybody’s Fool

    National Bestseller and a New York Times 2016 Notable Book

    In these pages, Richard Russo returns to North Bath, the Rust Belt town first brought to unforgettable life in Nobody’s Fool. Now, ten years later, Doug Raymer has become the chief of police and is tormented by the improbable death of his wife—not to mention his suspicion that he was a failure of a husband. Meanwhile, the irrepressible Sully has come into a small fortune, but is suddenly faced with a VA cardiologist’s estimate that he only has a year or two left to live.

    As Sully frantically works to keep the bad news from the important people in his life, we are reunited with his son and grandson . . . with Ruth, the married woman with whom he carried on for years . . . and with the hapless Rub Squeers, who worries that he and Sully aren’t still best friends. Filled with humor, heart, and hard-luck characters you can’t help but love, Everybody’s Fool is a crowning achievement from one of the great storytellers of our time.

    About Everybody’s Fool

    A New York Times 2016 Notable Book

    An immediate national best seller and instant classic from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls. Richard Russo returns to North Bath—“a town where dishonesty abounds, everyone misapprehends everyone else and half the citizens are half-crazy” (The New York Times)—and the characters who made Nobody’s Fool a beloved choice of book clubs everywhere. Everybody’s Fool is classic Russo, filled with humor, heart, hard times, and people you can’t help but love, possibly because their various faults make them so human.
     
    Everybody’s Fool picks up roughly a decade since we were last with Miss Beryl and Sully on New Year’s Eve 1984. The irresistible Sully, who in the intervening years has come by some unexpected good fortune, is staring down a VA cardiologist’s estimate that he has only a year or two left, and it’s hard work trying to keep this news from the most important people in his life: Ruth, the married woman he carried on with for years . . . the ultra-hapless Rub Squeers, who worries that he and Sully aren’t still best friends . . . Sully’s son and grandson, for whom he was mostly an absentee figure (and now a regretful one). We also enjoy the company of Doug Raymer, the chief of police who’s obsessing primarily over the identity of the man his wife might’ve been about to run off with, before dying in a freak accident . . . Bath’s mayor, the former academic Gus Moynihan, whose wife problems are, if anything, even more pressing . . . and then there’s Carl Roebuck, whose lifelong run of failing upward might now come to ruin. And finally, there’s Charice Bond—a light at the end of the tunnel that is Chief Raymer’s office—as well as her brother, Jerome, who might well be the train barreling into the station.

    A crowning achievement—“like hopping on the last empty barstool surrounded by old friends” (Entertainment Weekly)—from one of the greatest storytellers of our time.

    About Everybody’s Fool

    A New York Times 2016 Notable Book

    An immediate national best seller and instant classic from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls. Richard Russo returns to North Bath—“a town where dishonesty abounds, everyone misapprehends everyone else and half the citizens are half-crazy” (The New York Times)—and the characters who made Nobody’s Fool a beloved choice of book clubs everywhere. Everybody’s Fool is classic Russo, filled with humor, heart, hard times, and people you can’t help but love, possibly because their various faults make them so human.
     
    Everybody’s Fool picks up roughly a decade since we were last with Miss Beryl and Sully on New Year’s Eve 1984. The irresistible Sully, who in the intervening years has come by some unexpected good fortune, is staring down a VA cardiologist’s estimate that he has only a year or two left, and it’s hard work trying to keep this news from the most important people in his life: Ruth, the married woman he carried on with for years . . . the ultra-hapless Rub Squeers, who worries that he and Sully aren’t still best friends . . . Sully’s son and grandson, for whom he was mostly an absentee figure (and now a regretful one). We also enjoy the company of Doug Raymer, the chief of police who’s obsessing primarily over the identity of the man his wife might’ve been about to run off with, before dying in a freak accident . . . Bath’s mayor, the former academic Gus Moynihan, whose wife problems are, if anything, even more pressing . . . and then there’s Carl Roebuck, whose lifelong run of failing upward might now come to ruin. And finally, there’s Charice Bond—a light at the end of the tunnel that is Chief Raymer’s office—as well as her brother, Jerome, who might well be the train barreling into the station.

    A crowning achievement—“like hopping on the last empty barstool surrounded by old friends” (Entertainment Weekly)—from one of the greatest storytellers of our time.

    About Everybody’s Fool

    A New York Times 2016 Notable Book

    An immediate national best seller and instant classic from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls. Richard Russo returns to North Bath—“a town where dishonesty abounds, everyone misapprehends everyone else and half the citizens are half-crazy” (The New York Times)—and the characters who made Nobody’s Fool a beloved choice of book clubs everywhere. Everybody’s Fool is classic Russo, filled with humor, heart, hard times, and people you can’t help but love, possibly because their various faults make them so human.
     
    Everybody’s Fool picks up roughly a decade since we were last with Miss Beryl and Sully on New Year’s Eve 1984. The irresistible Sully, who in the intervening years has come by some unexpected good fortune, is staring down a VA cardiologist’s estimate that he has only a year or two left, and it’s hard work trying to keep this news from the most important people in his life: Ruth, the married woman he carried on with for years . . . the ultra-hapless Rub Squeers, who worries that he and Sully aren’t still best friends . . . Sully’s son and grandson, for whom he was mostly an absentee figure (and now a regretful one). We also enjoy the company of Doug Raymer, the chief of police who’s obsessing primarily over the identity of the man his wife might’ve been about to run off with, before dying in a freak accident . . . Bath’s mayor, the former academic Gus Moynihan, whose wife problems are, if anything, even more pressing . . . and then there’s Carl Roebuck, whose lifelong run of failing upward might now come to ruin. And finally, there’s Charice Bond—a light at the end of the tunnel that is Chief Raymer’s office—as well as her brother, Jerome, who might well be the train barreling into the station.

    A crowning achievement—“like hopping on the last empty barstool surrounded by old friends” (Entertainment Weekly)—from one of the greatest storytellers of our time.

    About Everybody’s Fool

    A New York Times 2016 Notable Book

    An immediate national best seller and instant classic from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls. Richard Russo returns to North Bath—“a town where dishonesty abounds, everyone misapprehends everyone else and half the citizens are half-crazy” (The New York Times)—and the characters who made Nobody’s Fool a beloved choice of book clubs everywhere. Everybody’s Fool is classic Russo, filled with humor, heart, hard times, and people you can’t help but love, possibly because their various faults make them so human.
     
    Everybody’s Fool picks up roughly a decade since we were last with Miss Beryl and Sully on New Year’s Eve 1984. The irresistible Sully, who in the intervening years has come by some unexpected good fortune, is staring down a VA cardiologist’s estimate that he has only a year or two left, and it’s hard work trying to keep this news from the most important people in his life: Ruth, the married woman he carried on with for years . . . the ultra-hapless Rub Squeers, who worries that he and Sully aren’t still best friends . . . Sully’s son and grandson, for whom he was mostly an absentee figure (and now a regretful one). We also enjoy the company of Doug Raymer, the chief of police who’s obsessing primarily over the identity of the man his wife might’ve been about to run off with, before dying in a freak accident . . . Bath’s mayor, the former academic Gus Moynihan, whose wife problems are, if anything, even more pressing . . . and then there’s Carl Roebuck, whose lifelong run of failing upward might now come to ruin. And finally, there’s Charice Bond—a light at the end of the tunnel that is Chief Raymer’s office—as well as her brother, Jerome, who might well be the train barreling into the station.

    A crowning achievement—“like hopping on the last empty barstool surrounded by old friends” (Entertainment Weekly)—from one of the greatest storytellers of our time.

    Read An Excerpt

    Reading Guide

    Read An Excerpt

    Reading Guide

    Read An Excerpt

    Reading Guide

    Read An Excerpt

    Reading Guide

    Read An Excerpt

    Reading Guide

    Also by Richard Russo

    The Destiny Thief
    Trajectory
    The Mysteries of Linwood Hart
    Elsewhere
    That Old Cape Magic
    See all books by Richard Russo

    Also by Richard Russo

    The Destiny Thief
    Trajectory
    The Mysteries of Linwood Hart
    Elsewhere
    That Old Cape Magic
    See all books by Richard Russo

    Also by Richard Russo

    The Destiny Thief
    Trajectory
    The Mysteries of Linwood Hart
    Elsewhere
    That Old Cape Magic
    See all books by Richard Russo

    Also by Richard Russo

    The Destiny Thief
    Trajectory
    The Mysteries of Linwood Hart
    Elsewhere
    That Old Cape Magic
    See all books by Richard Russo

    Also by Richard Russo

    The Destiny Thief
    Trajectory
    The Mysteries of Linwood Hart
    Elsewhere
    That Old Cape Magic
    See all books by Richard Russo

    About Richard Russo

    RICHARD RUSSO is the author of eight novels, most recently Everybody’s Fool and That Old Cape Magic; two collections of stories, with Trajectory published in 2017; and the memoir Elsewhere. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which like Nobody’s Fool was adapted to film, in… More about Richard Russo

    About Richard Russo

    RICHARD RUSSO is the author of eight novels, most recently Everybody’s Fool and That Old Cape Magic; two collections of stories, with Trajectory published in 2017; and the memoir Elsewhere. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which like Nobody’s Fool was adapted to film, in… More about Richard Russo

    About Richard Russo

    RICHARD RUSSO is the author of eight novels, most recently Everybody’s Fool and That Old Cape Magic; two collections of stories, with Trajectory published in 2017; and the memoir Elsewhere. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which like Nobody’s Fool was adapted to film, in… More about Richard Russo

    About Richard Russo

    RICHARD RUSSO is the author of eight novels, most recently Everybody’s Fool and That Old Cape Magic; two collections of stories, with Trajectory published in 2017; and the memoir Elsewhere. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which like Nobody’s Fool was adapted to film, in… More about Richard Russo

    About Richard Russo

    RICHARD RUSSO is the author of eight novels, most recently Everybody’s Fool and That Old Cape Magic; two collections of stories, with Trajectory published in 2017; and the memoir Elsewhere. In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for Empire Falls, which like Nobody’s Fool was adapted to film, in… More about Richard Russo

    Product Details

    Category: Literary Fiction

    Paperback | $16.95
    Published by Vintage
    Jan 24, 2017 | 544 Pages | 5-3/16 x 8 | ISBN 9780307454829

    Category: Literary Fiction

    Paperback | $28.00
    Published by Random House Large Print
    May 03, 2016 | 720 Pages | 6-1/8 x 9-1/4 | ISBN 9780735206038

    Category: Literary Fiction

    Ebook | $11.99
    Published by Vintage
    May 03, 2016 | 496 Pages | ISBN 9781101946961

    Category: Literary Fiction | Audiobooks

    CD | $55.00
    Published by Random House Audio
    May 03, 2016 | 1140 Minutes | ISBN 9780739376065

    Category: Literary Fiction | Audiobooks

    Audiobook Download | $27.50
    Published by Random House Audio
    May 03, 2016 | 1133 Minutes | ISBN 9780739376072

    People Who Read Everybody’s Fool Also Read

    ‹ ›
    The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
    Who Is Rich?
    The Misfortune of Marion Palm
    The Travelers
    The Windfall
    A House Among the Trees
    The Only Story
    Anything Is Possible
    A Long Way from Home
    White Tears
    August Snow
    The Largesse of the Sea Maiden
    Mrs. Osmond
    After the Fire
    Autumn
    A Gambler's Anatomy
    Dinner at the Center of the Earth
    The Locals
    Heroes of the Frontier
    Dear Mr. M
    Bright, Precious Days
    The Glorious Heresies
    Still Here
    The Mirror Thief
    Big Stone Gap
    Rubyfruit Jungle
    One Plus One
    Anne of Green Gables
    Still Life with Bread Crumbs
    Haroun and the Sea of Stories
    Someday, Someday, Maybe
    Fear of Flying
    The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
    The Weird Sisters
    The Imperfectionists
    Major Pettigrew's Last Stand
    Money
    Cranford
    The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
    Emma
    Measuring the World
    Me and Mr. Darcy
    Absurdistan
    An Evening of Long Goodbyes
    The Devil Wears Prada

    Inspired by Your Browsing History

    Praise

    “A delightful return to form. . . . Irresistible. . . . Very funny. . . . A joy.” —The New York Times

    “Profound and wise. . . . [Russo is] a writer of great comedy and warmth.” —USA Today

    “Elegiac but never sentimental. . . . Russo’s compassionate heart is open to the sorrows, and yes, the foolishness of this lonely world, but also the humor, friendship and love that abide.” —San Francisco Chronicle

    “For fans who’ve missed Sully and the gang, Everybody’s Fool is like hopping on the last empty barstool surrounded by old friends.” —Entertainment Weekly
    “A delight.” —The Washington Post

    Looking for More Great Reads?
    Download our Spring Fiction Sampler Now
    Back to Top

    Visit other sites in the Penguin Random House Network

    Books for Better Living

    Inspiration for the best you

    Brightly

    Raise kids who love to read
    TASTE img

    TASTE

    An online magazine for today’s home cook

    Signature

    Making Well-Read Sense of the World

    LitFlash

    The eBooks you want at the lowest prices

    Read it Forward

    Read it first. Pass it on!
    First to Read

    First to Read

    Early access to Penguin Random House’s hottest new titles
    Unbound Worlds

    Unbound Worlds

    Exploring the science fiction and fantasy universe