Richard Ford Books in Order

Two restless men, Robard Hewes and Sam Newel, arrive on a remote Mississippi River island for very different reasons. Obsession, loneliness, and violence gather around Ford's brooding debut novel.

Harry Quinn follows his girlfriend Rae to Oaxaca to help free her brother from jail. What starts as a rescue mission pulls them into danger, drugs, and a murky expatriate underworld.

Frank Bascombe is a former novelist turned sportswriter, living through divorce and grief after his son's death. Over one Easter weekend, his careful detachment begins to crack.

These ten stories follow drifters, families, and uneasy lovers across the American West, especially Montana. Ford writes about people at the edge of bad luck, bad choices, and brief hope.

This annual anthology gathers standout fiction, essays, and poetry from small presses and literary magazines. It offers a broad snapshot of independent writing from its period rather than a single-author collection.

In 1960 Great Falls, Montana, teenager Joe Brinson watches his parents' marriage come apart. As his father joins a wildfire crew, his mother begins an affair that changes Joe's view of adulthood.

Frank Bascombe, now a real estate agent, takes his troubled teenage son on a Fourth of July road trip. Their uneasy weekend becomes a test of fatherhood, freedom, and emotional risk.

Three long stories move from Montana to Paris and Chicago, tracing uneasy bonds between men and women. Ford follows desire, misreading, and the gap between intimacy and actual understanding.

Ford's stories circle marriage, adultery, secrecy, and regret. The characters often know they are doing damage, but not quite how to stop or what their choices will cost.

This compact selection samples Ford's fiction, including Frank Bascombe material and stories from major collections. It is a useful starting place for readers who want a quick taste of his range.

In 2000, Frank Bascombe is a New Jersey real estate agent facing Thanksgiving, prostate cancer, family complications, and a changed shoreline. The novel finds him older, sharper, and still arguing with himself.

Edited and introduced by Richard Ford, this wide-ranging anthology presents stories by more than forty American writers, pairing established figures with later generations of short-fiction voices. Louise Erdrich is represented by “The Plague of Doves,” alongside work by writers including Jhumpa Lahiri, Junot Díaz, and ZZ Packer.

Fifteen-year-old Dell Parsons is left adrift after his parents rob a bank in Montana. Separated from his twin sister, he is sent across the border to Saskatchewan, where safety proves uncertain.

Frank Bascombe returns in four linked stories set after Hurricane Sandy. At sixty-eight, he meets damage both literal and personal as old houses, old marriages, and old betrayals resurface.

This brief poetry collection presents a first-person view of prison life in Georgia. The poems focus on confinement, feeling, and the pressure of writing from inside the system.

Ford turns from fiction to memory in this compact memoir of his parents, Parker and Edna. Written with restraint and affection, it asks what a child can truly know about the lives that made him.

The second volume continues Ford's expansive guide to Spain, moving through regions, roads, cities, customs, and practical advice for travelers. It remains valuable for readers interested in travel writing and Spanish history.

This first volume of the classic Spain travel handbook mixes route guidance, history, art, manners, and sharp observation. It is less a quick guide than a richly detailed portrait of 19th-century Spain.

This collection gathers the correspondence of the 19th-century travel writer Richard Ford. The letters open a window onto his family life, friendships, travels, opinions, and work on Spain.

These later stories dwell on loss, divorce, aging, memory, and the people who stay with us after they leave. Ford's characters face grief in quiet rooms, dinners, and chance meetings.

Frank Bascombe, now in old age, cares for his son Paul, who has ALS. Their winter road trip toward Mount Rushmore becomes a hard, funny reckoning with love and mortality.