Adam Braver – författare

In this highly ambitious collection, Adam Braver explores Abraham Lincoln''s inner life and personal turmoils -- while also reflecting on the indelible impact Lincoln had on the nation during the last year of his presidency. Braver brings the president to life, not just as the strong and resilient leader of history books but also as a grief-stricken father, heartbroken over the loss of his young son.

Across a rich canvas of truth and imagination, Mr. Lincoln''s Wars reveals a president within the White House walls. We see Lincoln as he explores the meaning of loss through a chance encounter with the father of a slain soldier. And a good-hearted young Union soldier is quickly turned into a killer in the name of President Lincoln. Finally, there is the assassination and the autopsy, as seen through the eyes of John Wilkes Booth, Mary Lincoln, the assistant surgeon general, and one of Lincoln''s closest friends.

Brilliant in its depiction of the country during the waning days of the war, this book is an insightful and moving exploration of the myth of celebrity and the passions it arouses. More than anything, Mr. Lincoln''s Wars introduces a talented new writer whose storytelling ability knows no bounds.

Driving home at dusk, Claire Andrews, an art history professor at a prestigious New England university, accidentally strikes and kills a boy. Though immediately cleared of blame, she is nonetheless left psychologically devastated and haunted by the accident''s consequences. Meanwhile Claire wrestles with her study of Vincent van Gogh''s Crows over the Wheatfield and the painting''s mysterious relationship to its creator''s untimely death. As worrisome parallels between the suicidal artist''s life and her own begin to emerge, she''ll have to reconcile herself to her past to become whole again . . . or surrender to the darkness that is enveloping her.

Set over the course of one week in 1906, Divine Sarah reimagines the life of the legendary Sarah Bernhardt. Facing protests from the newly formed League of Decency, the controversial actress is forced to move her latest production from Los Angeles to the new development of Venice Beach. Though this battle is only the most recent skirmish in a tumultuous life, the sixty-two-year-old Sarah is exhausted and beginning to lose the will to fight.

Plagued by maladies of the flesh and the spirit, she begins to search her soul, revealing the truths of her life, including the self-doubt and insecurity hidden beneath an extravagant and confrontational lifestyle. Yet Sarah is not alone in her battle. Vince Baker, an ambitious news reporter, faces his own demons even as he tries to uncover the truth about the greatest actress of the Victorian Age.