Liberation Day: Stories

Liberation Day (2022) is a short story collection by the American writer George Saunders. The collection compiles nine stories that were previously published from 2013-22 in outlets including The New Yorker. Saunders is a writer of contemporary literary fiction known for his dark, biting humor and critical approaches to current topical issues. Although the stories in Liberation Day are not connected to one another, they share commonalities that reappear throughout the collection. Multiple stories, for instance, are set in dystopian futures in which a governmental or citizen-led collective oppresses a large group of unaware characters. Multiple stories deal with characters who are aging and who must confront their loss of youth and The Inevitability of Aging and Death. Several stories weave between viewpoints, narrating the same event from multiple perspectives, thereby highlighting the idiosyncrasy of individual experience. Several of the stories combine all of these stylistic and thematic approaches to illustrate the destructive power of Oppression and Control.

The collection falls under the literary fiction genre, as the stories stylistically investigate questions about the human condition and prioritize originality of prose over plot and action. Saunders has been compared to late 20th-century literary satirists including Kurt Vonnegut for his humorous approaches to bleak contemporary conditions (Vandenburgh, Barbara. “George Saunders’ New Book Liberation Day Will Make You Want to be a Better Human.” USA Today, July 12, 2013). Saunders follows from, and adapts, the literary tradition set out by the postmodernists of the late 20th century—Vonnegut, Don DeLillo, and David Foster Wallace, among others—in his treatment of anxiety-inducing existential crises and his realist but satirical treatment of modernity. His experimental literary fiction novel titled Lincoln in the Bardo won the Booker Prize in 2017.

All citations in this study guide are taken from the paperback edition of Liberation Day, published by Random House in 2022.

Content Warning: The source text and this study guide discuss oppression, mental and physical control, wartime violence, addiction, suicide, and sexual abuse.

Plot Summaries

“Liberation Day” follows Jeremy, a “Speaker” for the Untermeyer family. Jeremy and his Speaker colleagues are forced to “Speak” only according to their oppressors’ demands and must partake in “Speaking” performances for the elite and wealthy upper-class. Throughout Jeremy’s time with the Untermeyers, he has begun to fall in love with Mrs. Untermeyer, who visits him in secret and demands to be “Spoken” to in sensual and erotic ways. When a rebel group—led by the Untermeyer’s son, Mike—attempts to free Jeremy and his colleagues from their enslavement, Jeremy must make a choice between his freedom and protecting the woman he loves, Mrs. Untermeyer. Although he sides with the Untermeyers during the rebellion, Jeremy eventually has the epiphany that he is only an oppressed tool which the Untermeyers use for entertainment and social standing.

“The Mom of Bold Action” follows Derek and his parents after Derek is violently pushed to the ground by an unstable man. When two different suspects are called to the police station—who look very similar because they are cousins—Derek is unable to remember which man pushed him, so both men are released without punishment. Derek’s mother—a writer suffering from perpetual writer’s block—is preoccupied by this perceived injustice, and she writes a polemical essay about justice and retribution, which her husband, Keith, reads. Fueled by his wife’s essay, Keith violently retaliates against one of the suspects, before he and his wife learn from the police that the other man actually confessed to the crime. Derek’s mother deals with the guilt and remorse for her and her husband’s actions after seeing that the innocent man is permanently disabled from Keith’s attack.

In “Love Letter,” an unnamed grandfather writes to his grandson, Robbie. The grandfather is offering advice in response to Robbie’s previous query about his friends, G., M., and J., who are being investigated by the government for possible illegitimate citizenship or tampering with these investigations. Although the grandfather recognizes that Robbie may have romantic feelings for J. and cares deeply about his friends and their futures, he advises his grandson not to speak up or try to help them in any way. The grandfather explains that, in their highly moderated and controlled society, Robbie’s attempts to help his friends may be perceived as rebellious and, as such, Robbie may put himself in danger.

“A Thing At Work” follows Gen, a powerful and high-earning corporate employee, and Brenda, an office manager and administrator who works at the same company as Gen; their boss is Tim, who is preoccupied with small toy cars and trucks. When Brenda makes a comment about Tim that Gen worries might implicate her to their boss, she retaliates by telling Tim about Brenda’s history with stealing coffee and paper towels from the company kitchen and storerooms. Although Tim decides not to fire Brenda, Brenda responds by showing Tim receipts that reveal that Gen has fabricated wage claims during falsely reported company events. When Tim confronts Gen about this behavior, Gen tells Ed Maxx, an important client of the company and the man with whom Gen has been having an affair. Ed threatens Tim into firing Brenda and letting Gen off without punishment, which Tim does. While Gen carries on with her high level job, Brenda must contend with the loss of her job, which is especially stressful given that Brenda is a single mother who must financially support two adult children and has a criminal record that prevents her from obtaining dependable employment.

“Sparrow” is one of the shortest stories in the collection, and it is told from an observant, anonymous perspective within a small community. The narrator speaks for the town’s residents in his description of Sparrow, a local employee of the grocery store, who is a highly agreeable and unopinionated young woman. When Sparrow falls in love with another employee named Ricky, however, she realizes that she might have to cultivate her individual character and personality in order to get his attention. The community is surprised when Ricky falls for Sparrow in return, despite her lack of individuality, and they watch skeptically as the two have a happy relationship and, ultimately, marriage. Against all odds, the couple even prevails over the distaste of Ricky’s mother, who owns the supermarket, and eventually earns her support for their romance.

“Ghoul” takes place in a dystopian underground world that is controlled by forceful “Monitors” who oversee citizens’ behavior and speech. This underground world is organized like a massive amusement park, in which all of the citizens are assigned roles for attractions and performances; there have, however, never been any “visitors” to this society, and there never will be, although the workers are motivated by their leadership continually convincing them to practice for these visitors. This world is connected to a world above, which is, presumably, real-life contemporary society, by an “Egress Spout.” A citizen, Brian, begins a romance with a Monitor named Amy, and he and Amy blame another colleague, Gwen, for speaking out against the laws and structures of the society; she is murdered by a mob as punishment. Shortly after, Brian is sent a note from an old friend named Rolph, who claims to have gone up the Egress Spout as a teenager, at which point he realized that their world is completely closed off from the world above, meaning there were never meant to be visitors to the underground society. Then, other Monitors turn on Brian’s romantic interest, Amy; she goes up the Egress Spout to escape, as Brian is injured and hospitalized on suspicion of attempting to protect her. When Amy realizes the truth about their closed-off, manipulated civilization, she jumps down the Egress Spout to her death, and Brian decides to disseminate the truth more broadly, at the risk of losing his own life. The story ends in a cliffhanger after Brian makes this self-sacrificing decision.

In “Mother’s Day,” the psychologies of two elderly women, Alma and Debi, are explored through their shared love for the same man. The story is told from a third-person omniscient perspective, which enables the narrative to shift between Alma and Debi’s consciousnesses, illuminating each of their passionate feelings about the other woman. These stem from Debi’s affair with Alma’s now-dead husband. As Alma takes a Mother’s Day walk with her daughter, an intense hailstorm begins, and despite Debi’s hatred of Alma, Debi approaches to offer Alma an umbrella. However, Alma’s resentment toward Debi persists even through the storm, and she rejects Debi’s offering. During the storm, she has a heart attack and falls against a fence, at which point an ambulance is called. In Alma’s last moments of consciousness, she has a confused vision in which she attempts to apologize to her children in their baby forms.

“Elliot Spencer” follows an elderly man who is a pawn in an oppressive group’s project to brainwash and manipulate vulnerable people; he is fed vocabulary and forced to partake in demonstrative protests for the sake of publicity and media campaigns. Although Elliot has been brainwashed, snippets of his past life return to him when people use certain triggering words, and he remembers that he was experiencing homelessness and had an addiction to alcohol, and he was offered a spot on this group’s manipulative schemes as a way out of poverty. When Elliot is beaten during a protest, however, more memories come back to him, and his supervisors ask him to consider a new brainwash to return to his former unaware state. Instead, Elliot leaves the oppressive group and goes into the world alone, despite his lack of memory and social support, displaying his strength and courage even toward the end of his life.

In “My House,” an older man becomes fixated on a large, decaying estate that is on the market. He meets the owner, Mel Hays, while touring the house. Mel’s wife is ill and confined to a bedroom, and the large house has fallen into disrepair. The narrator makes an offer, but to his surprise, Mel rejects it. The narrator continues to make offers well above asking but is repeatedly ignored by Mel. The narrator gradually becomes obsessed with the house and frequently drives by it as it crumbles with age—mirroring the narrator’s own aging and decaying body. Eventually, the owner senses that his life is coming to an end and plans out a final letter to Mel, in which he apologizes for his obsession but continues to wonder why Mel refused to sell the house.