George Saunders: Lincoln in the Bardo

Kinda late to the dance on this one, but just finished his Booker-winning novel (2017). Really liked it, but it took some time to get used to. Experimental, polyphonic, a cast of 166 voices. Mostly about one single night in a kind of Nowhere zone for “souls,” somewhere between life, death and perhaps, reincarnation. Lincoln and his son, Willie, are the ultimate focus.

I probably should have picked a different book as my first foray into ebook formats. It was difficult enough to get used to Saunders’ unique style, but adding the strangeness of the small screen didn’t really help matters. And all the while, I felt guilty for breaking an old promise: never go over to the Dark Side and read in that new-fangled way.

The idea, however, of using an app to gain access to all kinds of books was too much of a temptation. Saving the trip to the library, doing all of this from home, etc. But it kinda baffles me — some of the rules. You have to put a hold on a lot of the books and wait your turn. They aren’t always available. I would have thought that, it being digital, they’d always have plenty of copies. Perhaps it’s a copyright thing, and it costs libraries per digital copy. Not sure. It also could just be their way of keeping track of things. Anyway . . . Old dog, new tricks, etc.

If any of you plan to read the book, be patient with it. It’s not a “page-turner,” at least not at first. Read on, cuz it gets better and better. Much humor, much compassion and pathos, and very wise in places. I thought of various books, plays and authors as I read, but the ones that rose to the top of the list were Flann O’Brien, Beckett (dark Vaudeville, sorta kinda), Wilder’s Our Town, and a dash of Dickens here and there.

I can see why it won awards.