I wrote this book through the worst of the pandemic, and it was a big tincture of melancholy of not using my life fully enough I believe I missed out on the nuances that are best known when you have been following a character through their past history.

Be Mine: : Richard Ford: Bloomsbury Publishing Be Mine: : Richard Ford: Bloomsbury Publishing

Is writing easier or harder for him nowadays? “Oh, writing novels is not hard, and even if it were, you can’t say that. No one wants to listen to that. No one gives a shit. You choose to do it, and as lofty an aspiration as it is, if you then want to talk about how hard it is, well, shut up.” But he is aware of how little time some young writers now have for older ones. “They’ve no use for us, and we weren’t that way when we were coming up. This kind of mendacious feeling of superiority… I never had contempt for John Updike. He got nothing but gratitude and high regard from me.” Frank is 76 or 77 (it's a bit confusing at times), semi-retired, and with several health problems. But everything else recedes when Frank learns from his sort-of estranged daughter than his son, Paul, 30 years younger than Frank, is dying of ALS. Frank enlists the help of a woman doctor with whom he once almost had an affair and Paul is admitted to the Mayo Clinic, which can't do anything for him. In the drawing room, we sit side by side, and prepare to talk about Frank Bascombe, Ford’s most famous creation and the man who’ll inevitably outlive him. Bascombe first appeared in his 1986 novel The Sportswriter – an American everyman who suffers an existential crisis after the death of his young son (a failed novelist turned sports journalist, Bascombe later moves into property). Three more books about him followed – Independence Day (1995), the second, won the Pulitzer prize for fiction – and now here is the fifth and, we are forewarned, final book in the series, Be Mine. Advancing age brings with it the examination of what life is all about. Frank had his own concerns, but they are framed much differently when it is his son’s story he is defining. Death has become the undeniable reality and its progress is being measured by Paul’s decline, something Frank cannot ignore. A line in the novella The Run of Yourself reads: “Things happen that seem life-altering, then everything grinds down to being bearable – sometimes slightly better,” which felt resonant in this pandemic moment. Do you think it applies?In brief, the novel tells two stories: The slighter, opening one is set during the Civil War. Through letters and a journal we meet a woman named Elizabeth who keeps a boarding house where she fends off a sly "gentleman lodger" — an itinerant actor — who, she says, "is keen to relieve me of my spinsterhood ..."

Be Mine’ Shows the Trump Era Through Frank Bascombe’s Eyes ‘Be Mine’ Shows the Trump Era Through Frank Bascombe’s Eyes

As readers we can feel the fear of that, and understanding of growing older, weaker, and more uncomfortable with a body that doesn’t work as well for us.

For his part, Ford intends to go on writing, but he’s also at peace with the possibility that whatever is in the tank, words-wise, may not “be anything”. How will he celebrate his big birthday next year? He smiles. “I am a man who generally asks my friends to just shut up and let me spend my birthday quietly. I don’t want people insincerely revving up the engines of their delight. But Kristina has asked me about it, so…” A party? Surely he should have a party. For a moment, he looks at me in a way that makes me feel very young. “Sweetheart, the best word I can think of to describe how I feel about my life is: surprised… Whatever we do, it won’t be jubilant.” I assume when I’m in Walgreens [the chemist] – and unfortunately, at my age, I often am in Walgreens – that 50% of people there are carrying. The reason they are doing this, ostensibly, is in case some malefactor tries to shoot them. But it’s blurry because I can tell you that when you walk around carrying a firearm, you look at everybody as a potential target. You’re basically thinking subliminally about the possibility that you will shoot. Over the course of four celebrated works of fiction and almost fortyyears, Richard Ford has crafted an ambitious, incisive, and singular view of American life as lived.Unconstrained, astute, provocative, often laugh-out-loud funny, Frank Bascombe is once more our guide to thegreat American midway.