Empire Falls
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 Cover of first edition | |
| Author | Richard Russo |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | Novel |
| Publisher | Knopf |
Publication date | 8 May 2001 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | Print (hardback and paperback) |
| Pages | 496 pp |
| ISBN | 0679432477 |
| OCLC | 46863970 |
| 813/.54 21 | |
| LC Class | PS3568.U812 E4 2001b |
Empire Falls is a 2001 novel written by Richard Russo. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2002, and follows the story of Miles Roby in a fictional, small blue-collar town in Maine and the people, places, and the past surrounding him, as manager of the Empire Grill diner.
Plot
A small, fictional mill town in Maine called Empire Falls, though once booming in industry, is quickly deteriorating. Dominated by the powerful Whiting family, the town can no longer sustain itself. Seen through the eyes of Miles Roby, the manager of the Empire Grill, which is also owned by Mrs. Whiting, his struggles with family, including his divorce and the life of his teenage daughter, Christina (nicknamed "Tick"), greatly mirror the condition of the town. His soon-to-be ex-wife Janine is going out with and preparing to marry the owner of a fitness center in town. As prospects for the town's future dwindle, the past is visited to explain Roby's history as well as those around him and the town itself.
A subplot of the novel involves a school shooting carried out by a poor high school student, who is orphaned after the death of his grandmother, and bullied by the rest of the school's students, particularly Tick's ex-boyfriend, Zack.
Miniseries adaptation
The novel was made into a two part mini-series that aired on HBO in 2005, starring Ed Harris, Helen Hunt, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Paul Newman (in his last live action role) and produced by Marc E. Platt. At the author's suggestion, much of it was filmed in Kennebunkport, Skowhegan, Winslow, and Waterville in Maine. It won a Golden Globe for Best Mini-Series in 2006.
Empire Grill
During the filming of the "Empire Falls" miniseries, a pizza parlor in downtown Skowhegan, Maine was transformed into a greasy spoon diner called Empire Grill, which closed six years later due to a depressed local economy. [1]
References
- ^ Doug Harlow, "Art imitates life as Empire Grill to close" http://www.kjonline.com/news/art-imitates-life-as-empire-grill-to-close_2010-02-23.html
External links
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