Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Mar 2024
240 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
From one of America's most celebrated storytellers come three dark, interlocking tales about the residents of a rural New York town, and the shocking headlines that become their local mythologies.
A husband sells property to a mysterious, temperamental stranger, and is hounded on social media when he publicly questions the man's character. A couple grows concerned when an enigmatic family moves next door, and the children start sneaking over to beg for help. Two dangerous criminals kidnap an elderly couple and begin blackmailing their grandson, demanding that he pay back what he owes.
Suspenseful, thrilling, and expertly crafted, American Spirits explores the hostile undercurrents of our communities and American politics at large, as well as the ways local tragedies can be both devastating and, somehow, everyday. Ushering the reader through the town of Sam Dent, Russell Banks has etched yet another brilliant entry into the bedrock of American fiction.
"Compelling narratives from this fine writer ... All these stories include ruminations on the passage of time, changes and damage in the landscape, and the values and aspirations sustained from generation to generation. The tone in these passages is almost elegiac: hymns to a past when fewer wounds were self-inflicted."
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Banks's stories are about fragile, everyday people whom, despite their resilience and strength, life still manages to break. An imaginatively constructed novel from a late master storyteller." —Library Journal (starred review)
"Elegant ... As ever, the reader senses the confidence in Banks's narrative voice. This is a welcome addition to the legacy of a master storyteller."
—Publishers Weekly
"I learned so much about storytelling and about our country reading these stories, and I finished the book full of gratitude that such a man, and a writer, as Russell Banks could have existed. We'll miss him and, I expect, won't see his like again."
—George Saunders, author of Liberation Day
This information about American Spirits was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: Robert Sargent Fay
Russell Banks was raised in New Hampshire and eastern Massachusetts. The
eldest of four children, he grew up in a working-class environment, which has
played a major role in his writing.
Mr. Banks (who was the first in his family to go to college) attended Colgate
University for less than a semester, and later graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Before he could support himself as
a writer, he tried his hand at plumbing and as a shoe salesman and window
trimmer. He taught at a number of colleges and universities,
including Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence, University of New Hampshire, New
England College, New York University, and Princeton University.
A prolific writer of fiction, his titles include Searching for Survivors,
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