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Lincoln in the Bardo - George Saunders
Lincoln in the Bardo
by: (author)
3.75 20
February 1862. The American Civil War rages while President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son lies gravely ill. Days later, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returns to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy's... show more
February 1862. The American Civil War rages while President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son lies gravely ill. Days later, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returns to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy's body. From this seed of historical truth, George Saunders spins an unforgettable story of familial love and loss that breaks free of realism, entering a supernatural domain both hilarious and terrifying. Willie Lincoln finds himself trapped in a strange purgatory – called, in Tibetan tradition, the bardo – where ghosts mingle, squabble and commiserate, and a monumental struggle erupts over his soul…

Written with George Saunders' inimitable humour, pathos and grace, Lincoln in the Bardo invents a thrilling new form and confirms him as one of the most important writers of his generation. Deploying a theatrical, kaleidoscopic panoply of voices – living and dead, historical and fictional – Lincoln in the Bardo poses a timeless question: how do we live and love when we know that everything we hold dear must end?
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Format: paperback
ISBN: 9781408871751
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing (NY)
Pages no: 343
Edition language: English
Category:
Contemporary
Bookstores:
Community Reviews
Just Olga and her books
Just Olga and her books rated it
4.0 Experimental, challenging, touching and funny at times but not a crowd-pleaser.
I thank NetGalley and Bloomsbury Publishing for providing me an ARC copy of this novel that I freely chose to review. First, in case you have not read the book or anything about it, and wonder what the bardo of the title refers to, it is a Buddhist concept (in Tibetan Buddhism, it seems, and I’ve re...
Thewanderingjew
Thewanderingjew rated it
2.0 Moving story about grief and choices.
Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders, author: Narrators, *too many narrators to list. It would take a hard-hearted person not to be moved by the story of the emotional collapse of Mary Lincoln and the terrible outward grief shown by President Abraham Lincoln when their young, very well loved 11 yea...
Murder by Death
Murder by Death rated it
4.5 Lincoln in the Bardo
So, I was shopping Bloomsbury's annual end of financial year sale the other day, when I was suddenly possessed by someone who reads award winning literature; not wanting to waste the money spent on the book, I wanted to read it before the exorcism, so I cracked it open as soon as it arrived. The ri...
"So it goes."
"So it goes." rated it
3.0 Lincoln in the Bardo (Audio)
I think I need to read this book. I know the audiobook has won award after award (as has the book), but it never really grabbed me. I couldn't keep my brain attached to the story. I got annoyed with it and kept rewinding, so I'm going to get an actual book copy of this from the library and try again...
Tower of Iron Will
Tower of Iron Will rated it
4.5 Life in a Sick-Box
Lincoln in the Bardo belongs to that rarest of fantasy sub-genres, novels about the society of ghosts living in a cemetery. Like Peter S. Beagle's 'A Fine and Private Place', the inhabitants of Oak Hill Cemetery are confused about their past and have some secrets. Like Neil Gaiman's 'The Graveyard B...
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