Richard Russo's NOBODY'S FOOL

As in EMPIRE FALLS, which won the Pulitzer Prize a couple of years ago, Russo sets NOBODY's FOOL in a town that continues to live on after the reason for its existence is gone. I finished this book a couple of days ago and am still haunted by the characters. It's laugh out loud funny at parts. What gradually dawned on me was that the story is really about how a 60-year-old man can be so haunted by his brutal alcoholic father that he still cannot get on with his life.

Now I realize that this book was made into a movie with Paul Newman. Gotta see that.