book
pick
Imagining the past
Historical-fiction author takes readers
inside the minds of famous figures
Signed book
giveaway
COSTCO HAS 50 copies of
Adam Braver’s Mr. Lincoln’s
Wars with signed bookplates
to give away. To enter, print
your name, membership
number, address and day-
time phone number
on a postcard or letter
and send it to: Adam
Braver, The Costco
Connection, P.O.
Box 34088, Seattle,
WA 98124-1088.
Or send an e-mail
to giveaway@
costco.com, with
“Adam Braver”
in the subject line.
No purchase is necessary. Open
to legal residents of the U.S.
(except Puerto Rico) who are age
18 or older at the time of entry
and who are current Costco
members. One entry per household. Entries must be received
or postmarked by March 3, 2008.
Winners will be randomly selected
and notified by mail on or before
April 3, 2008. The value of the
prize is $12.95. Void where prohibited. Winners are responsible
for all applicable federal, state
and local taxes. Odds of winning
depend on the number of eligible
entries received. Employees
of Costco or HarperCollins and
their families are not eligible.
By Chris Penttila
FOR NOVELIST Adam Braver, imag- started to inspire other stories in the
ining the private thoughts of famous book,” says Braver, who admits he
historic figures is all in a day’s work. didn’t realize how many Lincoln biog-The author of historical fiction is raphiesandhistoric accounts
intrigued by the ordinary moments existed. “Had I known,” he
in the lives of extraordinary people says, “it would have been too
who were larger than life in their daunting for me to even
times but remain mysterious even approach it.”
today. He uses his celebrated sub- Critics of historical fiction
jects—from Abraham Lincoln to think it borders on blasphemy
actress Sarah Bernhardt—to link eras to fictionalize the thoughts and
and people in ways that reveal our actions of revered individuals,
common humanity. For Braver, facts Adam Braver but Braver believes readers can
take a backseat to feelings. learn something from the creative exploration of
© MARION ETTLINGER
“When I’m writing, I’m more interested in how their psyches and the times in which they lived. It’s
people might have felt or experienced something just another way of getting at the truth, he says, add-rather than what it is that they did,” says Braver, who ing that people who read Mr. Lincoln’s Wars could
teaches creative writing at Roger Williams University find themselves comparing Lincoln’s era to today.
in Bristol, Rhode Island. Braver takes a come-what-may approach to
Braver’s first work of historical fiction, Mr. writing. He maps out narrative milestones but avoids
Lincoln’s Wars: A Novel in Thirteen Stories, published detailed storyboards, preferring to let the page lead
in 2004, is this month’s Book Pick. The book’s fic- the way toward new themes and narratives. “One
tional settings and characters revolve around thing I’ve learned is those things will reveal them-
President Lincoln, who might be the main character selves as one is writing,” he says. “There’s a sense of
in one chapter and the object of another character’s discovery when I’m done.”
thoughts or actions in the next. Braver’s latest historical novel, his third, explores
In one chapter, readers go along with Lincoln as Jackie Kennedy’s quiet moments on the plane ride
he visits a battlefield. In another chapter, readers go home from Dallas on November 22, 1963.
inside John Wilkes Booth’s head on the day he assas- Now that it’s done, he’s enjoying a few quiet
sinated Lincoln. Braver’s characters use contempo- moments of his own with his wife, Alisson, and their
rary language. “I wanted the feeling I was stepping 8-year-old son. “I’m very much a homebody. My
out my back door into this and not entering a sepia- hobby is avoiding going out,” says Braver with a
tone version of history,” he tells The Connection. laugh. “My hobby [writing] has become the way I
In regard to his own history, Braver was raised in live my life. I think it’s a lucky life.” C
California, an only child of parents who divorced
when he was young. He remembers spending time Chris Penttila is a freelance journalist based in
alone imagining entire worlds and narratives. A vora- Carrboro, North Carolina.
cious reader, he devoured The Chronicles of Narnia,
anything by Beverly Cleary and biographies of famous
people. Lincoln in particular piqued his curiosity
from a young age. “I loved Lincoln as a kid,” he says. Pennie’s pick
“He always seemed more than human to me.” I DON’T KNOW WHY, but I have always been fasci-
In 2001, Braver was working on a graduate nated by Abraham Lincoln. Sure there are other historic
degree in creative writing when he read a newspaper figures who are just as important, but there’s something
story about DNA testing on Lincoln’s hair to learn about Lincoln that has captured my imagination for as
more about his depression. Braver began to wonder: long as I can remember. So imagine my delight upon
How could Lincoln command a Civil War success- reading Adam Braver’s Mr. Lincoln’s Wars: A Novel in
fully while grieving over the death of his 11-year-old Thirteen Stories.
son, Willie, from typhoid fever in February 1862? He The stories in this book imagine Lincoln in numer-
wrote a short story about Lincoln as a side project ous settings and through the eyes a variety of people,
that morphed into 13 short stories about Lincoln including a friend, his wife, a young Union soldier and
from different perspectives. It’s these stories that even John Wilkes Booth.
make up Mr. Lincoln’s Wars. Braver’s Mr. Lincoln’s Wars is available at most
FRANCE FREEMAN
“I got very interested in that notion of how peo- Pennie Clark Ianniciello Costco Book Buyer Costco warehouses and on costco.com.
ple saw him versus what was really going on, which
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