Hello and welcome to Slate's Audio Book Club. I'm the program's producer Andy Bowers, and

today's book is Independence Day, the Pulitzer Prize-winning 1995 novel by Richard Ford. We chose Independence

Day because it's the precursor to Ford's recently published The Lay of the Land, and we thought

this was a good time to reread the earlier book. And before we

get started, this note, both the book and this podcast contain language that some listeners

may find objectionable. Remember, since this isn't radio, we won't be bleeping out that language.

Now here's the leader of this month's book club, Stephen Metcalf. Welcome to Slate's Audio

Book Club. My name is Stephen Metcalf, Welcome to Slate's Audio Book Club. My name is

Stephen Metcalf and I'm Slate's Critic at Large. I'm joined today to discuss Richard Ford's

Novel Independence Day by John Burnham Schwartz, a novelist and author of the novel's Bicycle Days,

Reservation Road. And forthcoming, this January 08, a novel called The Commoner,

and a lucky man has seen his novel Reservation Road turned into a film, which is forthcoming in

November. I'm also joined by Katie Roefe. She's a novelist and a nonfiction writer and a

contributor to Slate. Her books include the novel Still She Haunts Me, and she's author of the forthcoming nonfiction book, Uncommon Arrangements.

So we decided we would read the middle book and the Frank Bascombe trilogy by the novelist Richard Ford. I think by common consensus, it's considered the

best of the three, though the reputation of the most recent one. The lay of the land has yet to

settle. It's a very recent book. In the first book, which is called the sports writer,

we're introduced to Frank Baskin, who's a man approaching early middle age or in early middle

age. He is, in fact, a sports writer. Now by the second book, who's a man approaching early middle age or in early middle age. He is, in fact, a

sports writer. Now, by the second book, he's become a real estate agent. He lives in Haddam, New

Jersey, a very nice suburb that has echoes of some of its pleasure equivalence further north

in Connecticut. He's divorced from his wife, Anne, and as John reminded me, we don't actually know Anne. This is interesting. We don't know Anne's name in the first novel. She's just referred to as ex. X. But she's been given a name, a proper name, by the second book, Anne. With whom we come to understand he's still in love, quite clearly still in love with his ex-wife.

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