In this visionary sequel to The Sportswriter, Ford deepens his portrait of one of the most indelible characters in recent American fiction. In the aftermath of his divorce and the ruin of his career, Frank Bascombe now sells real estate, as he masters the high-wire act of "normalcy". But during the Fourth of July weekend, Frank is called into sudden, bewildering engagement with life.

"Grandma Mazur is a widow ... again. This time her marriage lasted a whole 45 minutes. The unlucky groom was one Jimmy Rosolli, local gangster, Lothario (senior division) and heart attack waiting to happen ... well, the waiting's over. It's a sad day, but if she can't have Jimmy at least Grandma can have all the attention she wants as the dutiful widow. But some kinds of attention are not welcomed, particularly when Jimmy's former "business partners"...

Although Jeff and Tad, encouraged by a new friend, Lindsey, make a deal to help one another overcome aftereffects of their cancer treatments in preparation for eighth-grade graduation, Jeff still craves advice from his older brother Stephen, who is studying drums in Africa.

"There is nothing like a golden retriever. I know, I know, it's a big planet with a lot of wonderful things, but golden retrievers are the absolute best. Mine is named Tara . . . The only problem she has ever caused is that I spend so much time with her in the mornings that I am almost invariably late for work." Whether dueling with new forensics or the local old boys' network, irreverent defense attorney Andy Carpenter always leaves them awed with...

"After Laurie Collins left him and headed west, New Jersey defense attorney Andy Carpenter didn't expect to ever see her again. So he's shocked when his ex-girlfriend appears on TV -- and then calls him pleading for his help. Two co-eds in Wisconsin have been found brutally stabbed to death. As the town's acting police chief, Laurie had to arrest a young college student with a carful of bloodstains who argued with one of the victims just before her...

On a cold October night, five people gather in a run-down motel on the Jersey shore and begin preparations to break into the Paragon Hotel, which is boarded up and marked for demolition. The five people are "creepers," the slang term for urban explorers or city archaeologists with a passion for investigating abandoned buildings and their dying secrets. On this evening, they are joined by a reporter who wants to profile them, anonymously, as this is...

New Jersey bounty hunter Stephanie Plum finds a whole town against her when she tries to apprehend Moses Bedemier, a store owner who jumped bail on a concealed weapon charge. It appears he is a vigilante keeping the town clean of drug dealers.

Ray Mitchell, a former TV writer who has left Hollywood under a cloud, returns to urban Dempsy, New Jersey, hoping to make a difference in the lives of his struggling neighbors. Instead, his very public and emotionally suspect generosity gets him beaten nearly to death. Ray refuses to name his assailant, which makes him intensely interesting to Detective Nerese Ammons, a friend from childhood, who now sets out to unlock the secret of his reticence....

"In this 'riveting' legal thriller, a German Shepherd police dog witnesses a murder -- and if his owner, an Iraq war vet and former cop-turned-thief, is convicted of the crime, the dog could be put down (Publishers Weekly). Few rival Andy Carpenter's affection for dogs, and he decides to represent the poor canine. As Andy struggles to convince a judge that this dog should be set free, he discovers that the dog and his owner have become involved unwittingly...

Ford reinvents Bascombe in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. In four richly luminous narratives, Bascombe attempts to reconcile, interpret and console a world undone by calamity. It is a moving and wondrous and extremely funny odyssey through the America people live in at this moment.