Czechoslovakia, 1968. The Soviet troops have just invaded and, for the young orphan Ilya, life is suddenly turned on its head. At first there is relief that the mean-spirited nuns who ran his orphanage have been driven out by the Red Army, but as the children are left to fend for themselves, order and routine quickly give way to brutality and chaos, and Ilya finds himself drawn into the violence. When the troops return, the orphans are given military training and, with his first-hand knowledge of the local terrain, Ilya becomes guide to a Soviet tank battalion. A position which leads him ever deeper into a macabre world of random cruelty, moral compromise and lasting shame.
Format: Paperback / softback
CONTRIBUTORS: Jáchym Topol
EAN: 9781846271625
COUNTRY: United Kingdom
PAGES: 320
WEIGHT: 226 g
HEIGHT: 198 mm
PUBLISHED BY: Granta Books
DATE PUBLISHED: 2013-06-06
CITY:
GENRE: FICTION / Literary
WIDTH: 129 mm
SPINE:
Book Themes:
Modern and contemporary fiction: general and literary, Fiction in translation
JÁCHYM TOPOL is an award-winning writer, famous in his youth as a samizdat poet and songwriter, and now for writing books that have successfully and imaginatively captured the dislocation brought about by the fall of Communism. His novels include Nightwork and The Devil's Workshop, which will also be published by Portobello.