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greenmachine31's review
3.0
Good read. Liked the main character and learned a lot about Ukrainian history.
kate66's review
4.0
4.5
This is a very emotional story of one family's experience in Ukraine dating back to the 1930s when an uncle of the author disappeared, along with hundreds of thousands of other during Stalin's reign of terror. The memoir is Victoria Belim's long and difficult search into exactly what happened and also to understand what caused her own father to take his life many years later.
This memoir gives you a truly terrifying insight into exactly how difficult it was to live during those times and, indeed, much more recent periods of Soviet rule in Ukraine. It certainly gives you a good look at the resilience and bravery of those still battling the Russians today.
When I think of how little it takes to upset our equilibrium here in the UK (a lack of petrol for a few days, no tomatoes for a week, the Internet crashed for 24 hours) you begin to realise just how very little we understand about Ukrainian mentality and it certainly made me aware of how tough these people truly are. If Zelensky says they will win then it'd be a brave person who would bet against them.
I found this a fascinating look at life in one small part of Ukraine and its people. I knocked off half a star because there were times that the narrator's Russian accent became quite difficult to understand.
I'd definitely recommend this to anyone interested in current or past Ukrainian history or even someone who is interested in any foreign political history.
Thankyou to Netgalley for the ARC audio version of this book.
This is a very emotional story of one family's experience in Ukraine dating back to the 1930s when an uncle of the author disappeared, along with hundreds of thousands of other during Stalin's reign of terror. The memoir is Victoria Belim's long and difficult search into exactly what happened and also to understand what caused her own father to take his life many years later.
This memoir gives you a truly terrifying insight into exactly how difficult it was to live during those times and, indeed, much more recent periods of Soviet rule in Ukraine. It certainly gives you a good look at the resilience and bravery of those still battling the Russians today.
When I think of how little it takes to upset our equilibrium here in the UK (a lack of petrol for a few days, no tomatoes for a week, the Internet crashed for 24 hours) you begin to realise just how very little we understand about Ukrainian mentality and it certainly made me aware of how tough these people truly are. If Zelensky says they will win then it'd be a brave person who would bet against them.
I found this a fascinating look at life in one small part of Ukraine and its people. I knocked off half a star because there were times that the narrator's Russian accent became quite difficult to understand.
I'd definitely recommend this to anyone interested in current or past Ukrainian history or even someone who is interested in any foreign political history.
Thankyou to Netgalley for the ARC audio version of this book.
frogqueen's review
emotional
hopeful
reflective
slow-paced
2.75
- a woman returns to her native ukraine to reconnect with her roots following russia's invasion of crimea in 2014, uncovering a family mystery that she is determined to solve
- for me this book was the literary equivalent of "this song seems like it is much more fun to sing than to listen to"
- (so i guess....this book seems like it was much more impactful to write than it was to read)
- for a memoir i found it kind of detached- i just didn't get a lot of emotion from the narrator (the author)
- between uncovering tiny tidbits about the mystery of nikodim, we get long passages about gardening and bureaucracy that were simply not engaging in the slightest
- the last 50 or so pages were the best part of the book- reflecting on all the different people, family or not, that she connected with across her journey, coming to terms with her father's death,
reconnecting with her uncle - i also liked the descriptions of different pieces of ukranian culture- the rushnyky, the easter meal and traditions.
**review of an arc that i received via goodreads giveaways**