Lincoln in the Bardo

by George Saunders (signed)

Easton Press Collector's Edition

Description: Leatherbound hardback book published by Easton Press in 2019. Bound in top grade black leather with 22kt gold lettering and cover artwork. Hubbed spine, acid neutral paper with page edges gilded, satin moire endpapers, and a satin ribbon book mark sewn in. Collector's note, certificate of authenticity, and unused publisher supplied bookplate laid in (not attached). Issued by Easton Press signed by the author on a special signature page without inscription or personalization. Issued by Easton Press as part of the Signed Modern Classics series. This novel was a New York Times number 1 bestseller and won the Man Booker Prize.

Synopsis: February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln’s beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. “My poor boy, he was too good for this earth,” the president says at the time. “God has called him home.” Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returns, alone, to the crypt several times to hold his son’s body.

From that seed of historical truth, George Saunders spins an unforgettable story of familial love and loss that breaks free of its realistic, historical framework into a supernatural realm both hilarious and terrifying. Willie Lincoln finds himself in a strange purgatory where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel, and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state—called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo—a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie’s soul.

Lincoln in the Bardo is an astonishing feat of imagination and a bold step forward from one of the most important and influential writers of his generation. Formally daring, generous in spirit, deeply concerned with matters of the heart, it is a testament to fiction’s ability to speak honestly and powerfully to the things that really matter to us. Saunders has invented a thrilling new form that deploys a kaleidoscopic, theatrical panorama of voices to ask a timeless, profound question: How do we live and love when we know that everything we love must end?

Condition: Binding - fine, new and unread, only removed from the shrinkwrap to take pictures. Dust jacket - none, as issued.

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