“The President and the Frog is a story about stories, and how to remember the seeds we can be even in the bleakest times. There is such lucid tenderness in the book, but it is also wild, and funny. As we move through time, we return again and again to love, to growth, but through struggle, and madness, and yes, magnanimous conversations with a frog. This book and Carolina De Robertis’s vision are a beautiful, shattered dance.”
—Tommy Orange, author of There There

“Carolina De Robertis is a brilliant and luminous writer, and The President and the Frog is a joy to read. Playful and profound, unearthly yet deeply rooted, this sublime and gripping novel is above all about hope: that within the world’s messy pain there is still room for transformation and healing.”
—Madeline Miller, author of Circe

From the acclaimed author of Cantoras comes an incandescent novel–political, mystical, timely, and heartening–about the power of memory, and the pursuit of justice.

At his modest home on the edge of town, the former president of an unnamed Latin American country receives a journalist in his famed gardens to discuss his legacy and the dire circumstances that threaten democracy around the globe. Once known as the Poorest President in the World, his reputation is the stuff of myth: a former guerilla who was jailed for inciting revolution before becoming the face of justice, human rights, and selflessness for his nation. Now, as he talks to the journalist, he wonders if he should reveal the strange secret of his imprisonment: while held in brutal solitary confinement, he survived, in part, by discussing revolution, the quest for dignity, and what it means to love a country, with the only creature who ever spoke back–a loud-mouth frog.

As engrossing as it is innovative, vivid, moving, and full of wit and humor, The President and the Frog explores the resilience of the human spirit and what is possible when danger looms. Ferrying us between a grim jail cell and the president’s lush gardens, and based on the real life of former Uruguayan president José Mujica, the tale reaches beyond all borders and invites us to reimagine what it means to lead, to dare, and to dream.

REVIEWS AND PRAISE

“Exceptional…a hopeful, entertaining paean to language, justice and perseverance…melding poetic imagery and bits of magical realism, De Robertis’s exquisitely written set pieces feature heady discussions about politics, equality and grace.”
—Kevin Canfield, The San Francisco Chronicle

“A moving, deeply felt novel, especially in the president’s excruciating (and sometimes humorous) encounters with his strangely healing frog. De Robertis daringly invites us to imagine a man’s Promethean struggle to wrest control of his broken psyche under the most dire circumstances possible.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“Without ever naming him outright, The President and the Frog takes [José] Mujica’s stranger-than-fiction life story and imbues it with a quirky, mystical grace…The President and the Frog reminds us that hope can be found anywhere, even in the most wretched conditions. And that is a shot in the arm we all could use.”
—Elena Britos, BookPage

“A writer who’s never been afraid to tackle political complexities head on…[The President and the Frog] promises to introduce her to a whole new audience with its playful but profound take on a democracy in crisis that bears some uncanny resemblances to our own.”
—Chicago Review of Books

“What [De Robertis] has accomplished with this compelling narrative, which is purposely set immediately after the 2016 U.S. election, is to produce a tale that is equal parts fable, political manifesto and utterly engaging testament to the resilience of the human spirit.”
—Bay City Books

“De Robertis…has crafted a tail of resilience, of the power of the human spirit to survive–a story set in a jail cell and rooted in the fantastic.”
—BookRiot

“I promise you: this is a political novel unlike any you’ve read before.”
—Jonah Walters, Jacobin Magazine

“Always surprising and unique, Carolina De Robertis has written a tale of home and resilience found within the depths of despair.”
—Ms. Magazine

“Visionary, biting with humor and deeply moving, The President and the Frog storms the limits of time and memory, human power and humility. De Robertis is a master storyteller and these pages astonish with their originality and brilliance.”
—Patricia Engel, author of Infinite Country

“This is the story of the poorest President in the world, and what strange and fantastic things took place when he was a guerrilla kept in captivity and in isolation down a hole. A novel about connection and loss, the miracle of storytelling as survival, The President and the Frog is unconventionally bold and utterly, utterly bright. A beautiful and entrancing meditation about marvel and what it means to live and grasp for life in despairing times. ”
—Ingrid Rojas Contreras, author of Fruit of the Drunken Tree

“A work of stunning insight and beauty, THE PRESIDENT AND THE FROG is a song of hope in despairing times, a meditation on freedom and survival, on the quiet exultations of the ordinary. A luminous, opulent, and unforgettable novel.”
—Cristina García, author of Here in Berlin

“Carolina De Robertis casts a bright light with all her work. I was delighted to open this book and very sad to close it. Her voice is what we need to bring us back to wholeness.”
—Luis Alberto Urrea, author of The House of Broken Angels

“Carolina De Robertis is the reason I read. It’s impossible not to fall in love with her characters, who are fierce, courageous and adventurous. Her powerful storytelling captivates the reader from start to finish.”
—Angie Cruz, author of Dominicana

“Carolina De Robertis is a force: prepare to be astonished.”
—R.O. Kwon, author of The Incendiaries