Reeling from the recent death of his invalid mother, a worn, jaded professor comes to our nation's capital to recuperate from his loss. What he finds there — in his repressed, lonely landlord, in the city's mood and architecture, and in the letters and journals of Mary Todd Lincoln — shows him new, poignant truths about America, yearning, loneliness, and mourning itself.

In GRIEF, Holleran summons voices from the past that eerily echo and spake to our won troubled times. It is a masterworks by one of Americas singular voices, a writer who is beloved for his depth of feeling, his humour, the elegance of his prose and his unflinching honesty.