One of the more exciting events during the past week, for me, has been Russell Banks's new novel, "The Reserve." Over the years I've read pretty much all of Banks's fiction, and "The Reserve" seems to me to be a substantial breakthrough, no mean accomplishment for a writer in his 60s. Although Banks has dealt with down-and-out characters and calamitous events in his books, "The Reserve" is a unique (for Banks) noir thriller. Set in his beloved Adirondacks in upstate New York during the 1930s when vast alpine estates known as reserves or posh "camps" were presided over by wealthy landowners, "The Reserve" pits a screwed-up gorgeous femme fatale socialite against a self-made artist-cum-airplane pilot, his Austrian wife, and an impoverished all but legendary local mountain guide in a series of spiraling encounters. Banks pits these riveting events against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War and the developing German Third Reich, including the gigantic dirigible, The Hindenburg.

All the more reason to tune into Claudia Cragg's interview of Banks, who speaks off the cuff about his intentions in "The Reserve." Answering Cragg's questions about Banks's rough-and-tumble youth, his participation in the 1960s Civil Rights movement, his Pulitzer Prizes, his personal encounter with Castro -- and so much more -- Banks is indefatigably well-informed and sage in his responses. Despite his having written what could be called "social novels," he professes no desire to have written perhaps the most socially and politically influential American novel of them all, "Uncle Tom's Cabin." Leave that to Harriet Beecher Stowe! Banks is obsessed with subtler stuff: "Things don't change at the center; they only change at the edges," he says, suggesting the depth of his unforgettable characters.

Today when the word "change" has become a political slogan, Banks's fiction, along with this crisp, clear interview, might change your world in subtle, truly significant ways.