Lincoln at the Bardo by George Saunders-A Novel Unlike Anything You're Thinkin'

George Saunders (b Amer) is an award winning writing of short stories ("The 10th of December") essays & novels.  His novel, "Lincoln at the Bardo" is a work of genius unlike anything I have read.  I highly recommend this profound theological perusal & anecdotedly footnoted historic study.   It's also a poignant reflection on grief & empathy.  Most assuredly, it's a lyrical affirmation of the wonders of life.  Nonetheless, its multiple narratives by the dead may repel many as macabre.  Perhaps some, believing the religious afterlife sacrosanct, will find the novel impertinent.  I argue the novel's wisdom is its unifying empathy for humanity.  Bardo is a term for the existence between death & rebirth which varies for each individual and determined by the life they've lead & age at the time of their death.  The novel combines factual history pertaining to Pres Lincoln & the Civil War and the President's painful grieving process for his son Willi.  Willi died at age 11 during the 1st year of the Civil War.  Pres Lincoln's personal, abysmal suffering is compounded with the understanding of the suffering the war is inflicting to so many under his command.  "Sorrow was not uniquely his.  All were in sorrow, or had been or soon would be."  Willi is laid to rest by his unconsolable father.  Willi's spirit becomes tethered to an afterlife in the graveyard where he is mentored by fellow spirits who've remained in a state of bardo. These ghostly beings learn from Willi the ability to immerse themselves into the beings of both the living and the dead and by doing so, fully come to understand, admire & respect the the other person.  "One must try to remember that all were suffering "none content; all wronged, neglected, overlooked, misunderstood, and therefore one must do what one could to lighten the load of those with whom one came into contact."  "Lincoln at the Bardot" so eloquently & uniquely speaks to the universal right for freedom and the cruelty of the oppressed.   Saunder's exceptional novel is a eulogy for the shared torment of loss & an ode to the limitless bounty of beauty found in nature & life.