George Saunders is an American writer known for his short stories, essays, novellas, children's books, and novels. Born on December 2, 1958, his work has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, McSweeney's, and GQ. He contributed a weekly column, "American Psyche", to The Guardian's weekend magazine between 2006 and 2008.

Currently a professor at Syracuse University, Saunders has received numerous awards, including the National Magazine Award for fiction in 1994, 1996, 2000, and 2004. He also won second prize in the O. Henry Awards in 1997.

His first story collection, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, was a finalist for the 1996 PEN/Hemingway Award. In 2006, he received a MacArthur Fellowship and won the World Fantasy Award for his short story "CommComm". In 2013, Saunders won the PEN/Malamud Award and was a finalist for the National Book Award. His story collection Tenth of December: Stories won The Story Prize for short-story collections and the inaugural (2014) Folio Prize. His novel Lincoln in the Bardo won the 2017 Booker Prize.

Before his literary career, Saunders earned a B.S. in Geophysical Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and worked in various professions, including as a technical writer and geophysical engineer, a doorman, a roofer, a convenience store clerk, and a guitarist in a country-and-western band.