25-year-old Gilbert Beilschmidt just got invited to something called the Dead Nations Society, and he's pretty sure it's a hoax. He had his reasons: 1) A crazy cat lady/librarian just claimed that reincarnation was real. 2) So were national personifications, apparently. 3) In a previous life, he was supposed to be the communist GDR. 4) Those dreams were just coincidences... Right?