Bruce

Holsinger

Oprah’s Book Club Pick

Award-Winning Novelist & Nonfiction Author

Travels from: Charlottesville, VA

“Holsinger has a sharp eye for the eternal values and foibles that animate human affairs. . . ” — Ron Charles, The Washington Post

Bruce Holsinger is the author of Culpability, the 116th selection of Oprah’s Book Club and hailed by Oprah Winfrey as “a must-read for all generations.” His four previous novels include The Gifted School, a Book of the Month Club selection and winner of the the Colorado Book Award; The Displacements, the inaugural title in the United Nations Read for Action Book Club; and The Invention of Fire and A Burnable Book, historical novels set in medieval London. He’s also written many works of nonfiction, most recently On Parchment: Animals, Archives, and the Making of Culture from Herodotus to the Digital Age.

His essays and reviews have appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, and many other publications, and he has been profiled on NPR’s Weekend Edition, Here & Now, and Marketplace. He is the editor of the quarterly journal New Literary History as well as a frequent instructor at WriterHouse, a nonprofit in Charlottesville. He teaches English at the University of Virginia and is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Bruce is available to speak and teach on a variety of subjects for public lecture series, libraries, universities, writing workshops, book festivals, research institutes, corporate events, and private foundations. His lectures and seminars on Artificial Intelligence, ethics, and the arts in 2026 will include appearances at the Center for Fiction in New York, the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Hunstville, Alabama, Caltech, and the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence in Abu Dhabi, among others. He also lectures regularly on the history of the book, historical fiction, fictions of climate change, and related topics, with recent appearances at DevEx World, the Getty Museum, the Beinecke Library at Yale, and in series at Harvard, Stanford, UCLA, Georgetown, and many others. “Plagues, Witches, and War,” his Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), has enrolled over 100,000 students worldwide.

Bruce's Featured Titles

Culpability (Oprah’s Book Club): A Novel

Spiegel & Grau |

July 8, 2025

Suspense Thriller

Oprah’s Book Club Pick * New Yorker Best Books of 2025 * 2026 Aspen Words Literary Prize Longlist * Kirkus Best Books of 2025 * Real Simple Best Books of 2025 * Washington Post Noteable Fiction 2025 * NPR’s 2025 “Books We Love” * Minnesota Star Tribune 20 Best of 2025 *

“I was riveted until the very last shocking sentence!”—Oprah Winfrey

“The most of-the-moment novel I’ve read all year, and it’s the book of the summer.”—Real Simple

“If you want an engaging novel sure to spark great discussion about that thorny [AI] future, this is it.”—Ron Charles, The Washington Post

“A gripping, impossibly timely thriller.” —one of NPR’s “Books We Love”

A suspenseful family drama about moral responsibility in the age of artificial intelligence.

When the Cassidy-Shaws’ autonomous minivan collides with an oncoming car, seventeen-year-old Charlie is in the driver’s seat, with his father, Noah, riding shotgun. In the back seat, tweens Alice and Izzy are on their phones, while their mother, Lorelei, a world leader in the field of artificial intelligence, is absorbed in her work. Yet each family member harbors a secret, implicating them all in the tragic accident.

During a weeklong recuperation on the Chesapeake Bay, the family confronts the excruciating moral dilemmas triggered by the crash. Noah tries to hold the family together as a seemingly routine police investigation jeopardizes Charlie’s future. Alice and Izzy turn strangely furtive. And Lorelei’s odd behavior tugs at Noah’s suspicions that there is a darker truth behind the incident—suspicions heightened by the sudden intrusion of Daniel Monet, a tech mogul whose mysterious history with Lorelei hints at betrayal. When Charlie falls for Monet’s teenaged daughter, the stakes are raised even higher in this propulsive family drama that is also a fascinating exploration of the moral responsibility and ethical consequences of AI.

Culpability explores a world newly shaped by chatbots, autonomous cars, drones, and other nonhuman forces in ways that are thrilling, challenging, and unimaginably provocative.

Celebrity Book Club Pick, Fiction, Grief & Loss, Mystery & Thriller, Science & Technology

On Parchment: Animals, Archives, and the Making of Culture from Herodotus to the Digital Age

Yale University Press |

February 21, 2023

History & Medieval Literary Nonfiction

A sweeping exploration of the shaping role of animal skins in written culture and human imagination over three millennia

“Richly detailed and illustrated. . . . An engaging exploration of book history.”—Kirkus Reviews

For centuries, premodern societies recorded and preserved much of their written cultures on parchment: the rendered skins of sheep, cows, goats, camels, deer, gazelles, and other creatures. These remains make up a significant portion of the era’s surviving historical record. In a study spanning three millennia and twenty languages, Bruce Holsinger explores this animal archive as it shaped the inheritance of the Euro-Mediterranean world, from the leather rolls of ancient Egypt to the Acts of Parliament in the United Kingdom.

Holsinger discusses the making of parchment past and present, the nature of the medium as a biomolecular record of faunal life and environmental history, the knotty question of “uterine vellum,” and the imaginative role of parchment in the works of St. Augustine, William Shakespeare, and a range of Jewish rabbinic writers of the medieval era. Closely informed by the handicraft of contemporary makers, painters, and sculptors, the book draws on a vast array of sources—codices and scrolls, documents and ephemera, works of craft and art—that speak to the vitality of parchment across epochs and continents. At the center of On Parchment is the vexed relationship of human beings to the myriad slaughtered beasts whose remains make up this vast record: a relationship of dominion and compassion, of brutality and empathy.

Academics & Education, History & Biography, Nonfiction

The Displacements: A Novel

Riverhead Books |

July 5, 2022

Literary Fiction

“Hypnotic.” – New York Times

“Cinematic.” – USA Today

“I gripped the covers of this book as though it might be blown from my hands. . .powerful.” – Ron Charles, The Washington Post

“A full-throttle page turner.”– Miranda Cowley Heller, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Paper Palace

An adrenaline-fueled story of lives upended and transformed by an unprecedented catastrophe

To all appearances, the Larsen-Hall family has everything: healthy children, a stable marriage, a lucrative career for Brantley, and the means for Daphne to pursue her art full-time. Their deluxe new Miami life has just clicked into place when Luna—the world’s first category 6 hurricane—upends everything they have taken for granted.

When the storm makes landfall, it triggers a descent of another sort. Their home destroyed, two of its members missing, and finances abruptly cut off, the family finds everything they assumed about their lives now up for grabs. Swept into a mass rush of evacuees from across the American South, they are transported hundreds of miles to a FEMA megashelter where their new community includes an insurance-agent-turned-drug dealer, a group of vulnerable children, and a dedicated relief worker trying to keep the peace. Will “normal” ever return?

Asuspenseful read plotted on a vast national tapestry, The Displacements thrillingly explores what happens when privilege is lost and resilience is tested in a swiftly changing world.

Environmental Concerns, Family Narratives, Fiction, Friendship & Community, Grief & Loss, Mystery & Thriller, Natural World

The Gifted School: A Novel

Riverhead Books |

July 2, 2019

Literary Fiction

“Wise and addictive… The Gifted School is the juiciest novel I’ve read in ages… a suspenseful, laugh-out-loud page-turner and an incisive inspection of privilege, race and class.”–J. Courtney Sullivan in The New York Times

“The summer read that predicted the college-admissions scandal.” –The Wall Street Journal

Smart and juicy, a compulsively readable novel about a previously happy group of friends and parents that is nearly destroyed by their own competitiveness when an exclusive school for gifted children opens in the community

This deliciously sharp novel captures the relentless ambitions and fears that animate parents and their children in modern America, exploring the conflicts between achievement and potential, talent and privilege.

Set in the fictional town of Crystal, Colorado, The Gifted School is a keenly entertaining novel that observes the drama within a community of friends and parents as good intentions and high ambitions collide in a pile-up with long-held secrets and lies. Seen through the lens of four families who’ve been a part of one another’s lives since their kids were born over a decade ago, the story reveals not only the lengths that some adults are willing to go to get ahead, but the effect on the group’s children, sibling relationships, marriages, and careers, as simmering resentments come to a boil and long-buried, explosive secrets surface and detonate. It’s a humorous, keenly observed, timely take on ambitious parents, willful kids, and the pursuit of prestige, no matter the cost.

Family Narratives, Fiction, Friendship & Community, Mystery & Thriller

The Invention of Fire: A Novel

William Morrow |

April 21, 2015

Medieval Historical Fiction

The author of the acclaimed historical thriller A Burnable Book once again brings medieval London alive in all its color and detail in a riveting novel that imagines the beginnings of gun violence in the Western world.

London, 1386: A mass murder has taken place within the city walls. Sixteen corpses have been dumped where they are sure to be found, bearing wounds like none seen before. John Gower, middling poet and expert trader in secrets, is summoned to investigate the killings even as the ruthless mayor of London seeks to thwart an open inquiry for reasons unknown. Gower learns that the men have fallen victim to handgonnes, new and terrifying weapons that threaten to change the future of war. Challenged by deception and treachery on all sides, Gower struggles against his failing vision even as his inquiries take him from the City’s labyrinthine slums to the port of Calais to the forests of Kent, where his friend Geoffrey Chaucer serves as justice of the peace. As Gower strives to discover the source of the new guns and the identity of those who wielded them, he must risk everything to reveal the truth – and prevent a more devastating massacre on London’s crowded streets …

Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery & Thriller

A Burnable Book: A Novel

William Morrow |

February 18, 2014

Medieval Historical Fiction

*WINNER OF THE JOHN HURT FISHER PRIZE

*SHORT-LISTED FOR THE AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATIONS’S YEAR’S BEST IN CRIME FICTION
In Chaucer’s London, betrayal, murder, royal intrigue, mystery, and dangerous politics swirl around the existence of a prophetic book that foretells the deaths of England’s kings. Bruce Holsinger’s A Burnable Book is an irresistible historical thriller reminiscent of the classics An Instance of the Fingerpost, The Name of the Rose, and The Crimson Petal and the White.

London, 1385. Surrounded by ruthless courtiers–including his powerful uncle, John of Gaunt, and Gaunt’s artful mistress, Katherine Swynford–England’s young, still untested king, Richard II, is in mortal peril, and the danger is only beginning. Songs are heard across London–catchy verses said to originate from an ancient book that prophesies the end of England’s kings–and among the book’s predictions is Richard’s assassination. Only a few powerful men know that the cryptic lines derive from a “burnable book,” a seditious work that threatens the stability of the realm. To find the manuscript, wily bureaucrat Geoffrey Chaucer turns to fellow poet John Gower, a professional trader in information with connections high and low. Gower discovers that the book and incriminating evidence about its author have fallen into the unwitting hands of innocents, who will be drawn into a labyrinthine conspiracy that reaches from the king’s court to London’s slums and stews–and potentially implicates his own son. As the intrigue deepens, it becomes clear that Gower, a man with secrets of his own, may be the last hope to save a king from a terrible fate.

Medieval scholar Bruce Holsinger draws on his vast knowledge of the period to add colorful, authentic detail–on everything from poetry and bookbinding to court intrigues and brothels–to this highly entertaining and brilliantly constructed epic literary mystery that brings medieval England gloriously to life.

Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery & Thriller

The Premodern Condition: Medievalism and the Making of Theory

University of Chicago Press |

December 1, 2005

Medieval Literary Criticism

The Premodern Condition identifies and explains a surprising affinity for medievalism and medieval studies among the leading figures of critical theory. Drawing on a wide range of philosophical, literary-critical, and sociological works produced within the French nouvelle critique of the 1960s, Holsinger argues for reconceiving these discourses, in part, as a brilliant amalgamation of medievalisms.

Holsinger shows that the preoccupation with medieval cultures and practices among Bataille, Derrida, Lacan, Barthes, Bourdieu, and their cohorts was so wide ranging that it merits recognition as one of the most significant epiphenomena of postwar French thought. Not simply an object of nostalgic longing or an occasional source of literary exempla, the medieval epoch was continually mined by these thinkers for specific philosophical vocabularies, social formations, and systems of thought.

To supplement its master thesis, The Premodern Condition also contains original essays by Bataille and Bourdieu—translated here for the first time into English—that testify in various ways to the strange persistence of medievalisms in French postwar avant-garde writings. What results is an important and original work that will be a touchstone for specialists in medieval studies and critical theory alike.

Academics & Education, History & Biography, Nonfiction

But Is It Good? AI, Ethics, and Imagination

AI and/vs. Art

AI and the University in Peril

Environmental Fiction: Five Theses

The Climates of Fiction

Strange Histories of the Book

The Alchemy of Research: From Archive to Page

“Bruce was amazing – he curated the presentation based on our audience and his presentation went beyond the book into his background with Old and Medieval english literature and manuscripts. He reading of Beowulf in old english was incredible. He was very welcoming to everyone during book sales and signing. Many people reached out to me, specifically, to convey their appreciation.” — Howard County Library, 2026

“Bruce Holsinger’s visit as winner of the 2026 One Book One Lincoln for Culpability was energizing and capped off an outstanding 25th anniversary for our community read program. Bruce was a terrific conversationalist and engaged well with our facilitator and audience, and attendees appreciated his well-rounded knowledge on all topics. We’re proud of our community-led program and look at 2026’s events, Culpability, and Bruce’s role as a tremendous success!” — LCL Director, Ryan Wieber, 2026

“Bruce Holsinger speaks eloquently about his creative process and the central intellectual and moral questions that motivated his decision to write Culpability. He is personally engaging and eager to share his experience and insights with students and faculty alike.” — Brunswick School, 2026

“Bruce Holsinger is an engaging presenter, capable of both delivering a polished, inspirational set presentation and thinking quickly and handling a tremendous variety of questions and questioners on his feet. Our audiences were impressed with both his artistry as a storyteller and his scholarship, given the tremendous research he uses to support his work.” — West Shore Community College, 2026

“Bruce was a delight to work with for this event. He brought a great perspective that was thought provoking and encouraged our attendees to think beyond the surface level.” — Curley Company, 2026

“I was riveted until the very last shocking sentence!” — Oprah Winfrey

“The most of-the-moment novel I’ve read all year, and it’s the book of the summer.” — Real Simple

“Holsinger seems to have created his own subgenre of psychosocial thriller, spinning super-smart, propulsive page-turners out of zeitgeisty worries . . . If you are not already hooked on Holsinger, it’s time to join the club.” — Kirkus, starred review

“In this twisty family drama . . . Holsinger grapples evocatively with the trade-offs of automated life. This timely tale leaves readers with much to chew on.” — Publishers Weekly

“Bruce Holsinger has written a novel that is as propulsive as it is thought-provoking, a thriller with a brain. Reminiscent of the work of Richard Powers and Don DeLillo, Culpability is a compelling narrative about the perils of the digital age while addressing the challenges of living as a family. This novel might feel futuristic, except it isn’t. It’s happening now.” — Mary Morris, author of The Red House

“A fascinating, thought-provoking novel. Bruce Holsinger is a master at combining revelatory social commentary about important, timely issues (AI this time) with deeply moving insights about family dynamics. I highly, highly recommend this book.” — Angie Kim, author of Happiness Falls

“Culpability is a wildly timely book, an exploration of the ethics of the technology age tucked inside a gripping story about family and loyalty. It’s equally emotional, entertaining, and important, and I lingered over every page.” — Janelle Brown, author of What Kind of Paradise

“Culpability is a thought-provoking and riveting meditation on family, parental love, morality and artificial intelligence—and where they all intersect. A wise, propulsive, and deeply powerful novel.” — Laura Dave, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Last Thing He Told Me

“In Culpability, Bruce Holsinger brings his sharp eye and fearless storytelling to one of the most urgent questions of our time: What does it mean to be responsible in a world shaped by systems we no longer fully control? Part family drama, part techno-thriller, this riveting novel traces the moral fallout of a self-driving car crash through the lens of a fractured family. With piercing insight and deep compassion, Holsinger captures the unsettling drift between human intention and algorithmic consequence—never losing sight of the fragile, fallible people at the heart of the story. Gripping, wise, and eerily prescient, Culpability is a family novel for the age of AI.” — Christina Baker Kline, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Orphan Train

Bruce’s Events Link

Honors, Awards & Recognition

Oprah’s Book Club Pick
New Yorker Best Books of 2025
2026 Aspen Words Literary Prize Longlist
Kirkus Best Books of 2025
Real Simple Best Books of 2025
Washington Post Noteable Fiction 2025
NPR’s 2025 “Books We Love”
Minnesota Star Tribune 20 Best of 2025
National Bestseller
Goodreads Choice Award Nominee
Winner of the John Hurt Fisher Prize
Shortlisted for the American Library Associations Year’s Best in Crime Fiction
Book of the Month Club Selection
Colorado Book Award Winner
2025 Owl Award Winner