Everybody's Fool

Everybody’s Fool is a 2016 novel by American Pulitzer Prize–winning author Richard Russo. The second in Russo’s North Bath trilogy, Everybody’s Fool is set in the small, eccentric, and troubled town of North Bath, New York. The tragicomic novel follows a group of characters whose dramas unfold over a single Memorial Day Weekend, exploring how individuals react to and rebel against their emotional and moral ties to their communities. The novel also grapples with existential themes, considers the relationship of the living to the memory of the dead and to their own mortality, and raises questions about the value of moral endeavor in a cruelly arbitrary world. The novel is a sequel to Nobody’s Fool (1993), which was adapted into a 1994 film starring Paul Newman, and is followed by Somebody’s Fool (2023).

This guide is based on the 2017 Allen & Unwin Edition (London).

Content Warning: The novel contains domestic violence and racist language.

Plot Summary

Douglas Raymer, the police chief of North Bath, goes to the funeral of Judge Flatt, with whom he was not on particularly good terms. Raymer arrives late, having been tied up in a search effort for Mayor Moynihan’s mentally ill wife, Alice. The cemetery reminds Raymer of the funeral of his own wife, Becka. Becka died in a random accident, falling down the stairs moments after she announced that she was leaving Raymer for someone she loved more. Throughout the novel, Raymer is preoccupied with a garage door opener she left behind, believing that if he traverses the entire town, it will eventually activate the garage door of her lover.

During the funeral, Donald “Sully” Sullivan, is in Hattie’s Diner. He has little time left to live due to a heart condition. Hattie’s is owned by Sully’s ex-lover, Ruth. In the years since their breakup, they have remained friends. Roy Purdy, a notorious abuser of women who was once married to Ruth’s daughter Janey, barges in and pressures Ruth into giving him free food. Just then, the town experiences a minor earthquake: A gas line explodes at the Old Mill, causing a wall to collapse on top of Roy Purdy’s car and Raymer to faint into the judge’s open grave.

A clerk at the police station, Charice, informs Raymer that strange activity had been reported near the Old Mill. After investigating, Raymer discovers that his apartment building, the Morrison Arms, is infested with snakes belonging to a black market animal salesman. Charice offers Raymer to stay at her house, where he learns from Charice’s brother Jerome, a police liaison to the nearby Schuyler Springs, that the North Bath police department will soon be incorporated into Schuyler Springs, resulting in job cuts and demotions.

That night, a thunderstorm passes over town. Raymer is struck by lightning and finds his personality split in two: the conscientious but ineffectual Douglas and the more ruthless, self-centered, and youthful Dougie.

Janey and Roy spend the night together, and Ruth discovers them the next morning. She screams at Roy, who retaliates violently, striking her in the head repeatedly with a glass. Sully hits Roy over the head with a frying pan, saving Ruth. Roy makes a getaway before the police get to the scene. Ruth is rushed to the hospital, where she is lucky to survive.

Roy schemes to get back at Sully by setting his trailer on fire while he is away. At the same time, Sully looks for Roy while suffering worsening cardiac symptoms. He passes out and is picked up by an ambulance. Ruth’s husband, Zack, goes looking for Sully at his trailer to tell him about Ruth. Instead he finds Roy inside the trailer; realizing his motives, Zack sets fire to the trailer while Roy is still inside, killing him.

Thanks to Dougie, Raymer catches the black market snake salesman the next day. Raymer also discovers that his wife was in love with Jerome, and that Charice knew but kept silent out of loyalty for her brother. Charice admits her love for Raymer and the two begin a relationship.

Sully makes it through a risky heart surgery and comes out on the other side miraculously healthy.