A profound and heartrending work of spiritual storytelling from the internationally acclaimed author of Dead Stars.

Bruce Wagner has called ‘a visionary posing as a farceur’ (Salman Rushdie) and an heir to Nathanael West. In The Empty Chair, he takes his storytelling in a radically new direction with two linked novellas. In First Guru, a gay Buddhist living in Big Sur achieves enlightenment in the horrific aftermath of his child’s suicide. In Second Guru, Queenie, an aging wild child, returns to India to complete the spiritual journey of her youth.

Told in ravaged, sensuous detail to a fictional Wagner by two strangers on opposite sides of the country, years apart from each other, these stories illuminate the random, chaotic nature of human suffering and the miraculous strength of the human spirit.

‘Lushly embroidered with allusions of the Beat Generation …Wagner meditates on our fundamental cravings for connections-both human and divine.’ Kirkus Reviews (starred)

‘ The Empty Chair dares to enter a sanctuary that few contemporary authors are willing to set foot in.’ The Washington Post Book World