According to Robert Faggen in The Paris Review, Banks’s debut novel, Family Life, “was not a critical success”. But this, his next volume, a collection of short stories called Searching for Survivors, won Banks an O. Henry Award. Many have admired Russell Banks’ realistic writing, which often explores American social dilemmas and moral struggles. Reviewers have appreciated his portrayal of the working-class people struggling to overcome destructive relationships, poverty, drug abuse, and spiritual confusion.

Banks died from cancer on January 7, 2023, at the age of 82.

Published by Fiction Collective, 1975. Hardcover. 1st Edition; 1st Printing. This book is in Near Fine condition and has a Near Fine dust jacket. The book and its contents are in clean, bright condition. The text pages are clean and bright. The dust jacket is crisp and clean. An attractive copy of the first important book of one of the great American stylists of the 20th century.