Empire Falls is a Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Richard Russo set in a town by the same name in Maine. The book which flits back and forth between the present and the past and captures the small town class hierarchy of a small town has tragedy woven right through every one of its main characters. The book is populated by many characters – some of who are dead but nevertheless retain a larger than life shadow over those who life. The chief character of the book is Miles Roby, a kind hearted man, who is the manager of the Empire Grill, a fast food place owned – like every thing else by the Whiting family, the local zamindar er… tycoons, who own just about every thing in the town.
The living representative of the dynasty is Francine, the widow of C.B.Whiting, whose grand father founded the town. At the time when the story is set, C.B.Whiting is dead, though his is one of the larger than life characters that overshadow the book. Empire Falls was once a town of mills and the factories – all of which owned by the Whitings of course but which generated employment for the town’s people and gave them the stability they needed to get on with their lives. But as the book opens, the mills and looms are shut and a lot of the custom that one day patronized the Empire Grill has also gone. Miles’ brother David is forever trying to come up with innovations to keep the crumbling restaurant going even as Miles himself is worried about the future.
He worries about his teenaged daughter Tick, agonizing over his upcoming divorce and grieving and wondering about whether he has failed his mother Grace(another dead character who looms larger than life!) and of course his own timidity and attitude which he believes is partly to blame because he hasn’t been able to talk over any bold initiatives with Mrs. Whiting during their annual review meetings. Empire Falls is a great attempt at capturing life in a small town and how the economy is often dependant on the survival of a few factories and industries which are its life lines and which in turn provide sustenance to a whole lot of subsidiary establishments like the bars and the fast food establishments.
In a way, it would have been a much easier read if Richard Russo and explored the dynamics of small town living by probing the equation of the Whitings and the Miles Roby. The many peripheral characters make the field crowded as the book progresses. They include Miles’ self focused father Max, a senile priest, an abused child, a bunch of teachers and school kids from the local high school, the town police man. The sub plots around each one makes an other wise story complex though they do serve to make the point that even in a small town, a lot is happening that is below the iceberg.
That collective angst could be captured in the line that Richard Russo puts in near the end of his pretty lengthy novel “When you are older, you will understand. There are things that grown ups intend and want to do, but some times just cant”. I suppose that adulthood is about rediscovering that truth afresh. every day.