A review by msgtdameron
Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman

5.0

Great Great book. One feels the mental anguish each character goes through along the journey. The journey from the time of loss to the time of victory that the battle for Stalingrad represented. Many of the characters are Jewish so the feeling of patriotism coupled with the knowledge that they are second class in Soviet Russia, this juxtaposition of faith in country and faith in their God make for great angst. The suffering that was Russia during the Great Patriotic War can be felt in these pages. This leads to my one complaint. One of the main characters, Victor a physicist, spends page after page bemoaning his fate both good and bad. by page 650 one wants him to just get over it already. Look old man, Toya is dead, being a Jew in Russia is terrible, being a Jew under Stalin is better than under Hitler, and Stalin will die before the last purge, the purge of the Jews happens, so please, please just shut up. The good point is that within a page or two the scene changes and Victor is not heard from for awhile. Only complaint. other wise this is one fantastic book. Especially the scenes in house 1/6. Just wonderfully written. Grossman is an heir to Dostoyevsky, Gogol and Lermontov.