Before Abraham Lincoln was a bearded wise man saving democracy, he was young, timid, and hopelessly in love.
ABE & ANN is a novel based on the little-known story of Abraham Lincoln's passionate romance in his twenties. Auburn-haired Ann Rutledge, feisty and fed-up with propriety, is frontier royalty, the 18-year-old daughter of the founder of the rough little frontier village where the 22-year-old Abe Lincoln comes looking for work. She is lively and literate and funny, and Abe is straight off his daddy's farm with jug ears and one change of clothes.

Homely and poor, but full of high ambition, the young Lincoln courts the dazzling red-haired woman who comes into his life like a revelation. In the spell of their feelings, the lovers question the limits in their lives and boldly dream a better future. But she is engaged to another man.

Readers who enjoyed Doris Kearns Goodwin's bestselling Lincoln book Team of Rivals, Steven Spielberg's blockbuster film Lincoln, and George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo will marvel again at this very different and compelling tale of Lincoln as a young man.

Not a grand historical treatment but a lyrical telling of a deeply personal tale, ABE & ANN dares to give readers an earnest but untutored Lincoln whose humanity every reader can share, who was weak before he was strong, frightened before he was bold, and deeply in love with a woman who despite their passionate encounters would never be his... or would she?