Lincoln in the Bardo : WINNER OF THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2017 by George Saunders

Lincoln in the Bardo is a novel by George Saunders. It is described as Saunders’ first novel.

• Novel
• Author: George Saunders
• First novel by the author
• Set during the American Civil War

Against the backdrop of the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln’s eleven-year-old son, Willie, falls gravely ill and dies within days. He is buried in a Georgetown cemetery, and newspaper reports describe Lincoln returning alone to the crypt to hold his child’s body.

Building from this historical detail, the book moves beyond realism into a supernatural setting. Willie is portrayed as caught in a transitional realm known in Tibetan tradition as the bardo, where ghosts gather to argue, complain and console one another as a struggle unfolds around the boy’s fate. The narrative takes place over a single night and is told through a wide-ranging chorus of voices, both living and dead, historical and fictional.