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

“Liberation Day” is the eponymous short story in Saunders’s collection. The story opens with a first-person narrator who says that it is the third day of “Interim” and who also immediately introduces other characters: Mr. U, Mrs. U, and their son, Mike, who is an adult. The narrator speaks for a collective “we,” wondering when the others will return to a “Podium” to allow the narrator and his collective to “Speak” (3). Mr. U approaches the narrator, Jeremy, and his two companions Craig and Lauren, who are all in the “Listening Room.” Mrs. U asks Mr. U what he is doing, and he explains that he is “jamming.” Then, Mr. U sends a “Pulse,” which enables Jeremy, Craig, and Lauren to speak according to his chosen settings. Tonight, they are tasked to speak about “Nautical.” When Mr. U does not send pulses to Jeremy, Craig, and Lauren, they are forbidden to speak, and they must stay still in certain positions against the speaking wall. If the narrator and his peers do speak out of turn, they will be punished.