Aleksei Ivanov – The Hound Headed in Italy

new publication

Italian translation published by Voland

Aleksei Ivanov is at home in different genres. But he is always interested in those times, places and events in Russian culture where a transition from one cultural system to another takes place. In his novel THE HOUND HEADED it is the clash between strangers from the big city with their Mercedes bus, their notebooks and mobile phones including social networks – and a village community, which has degenerated from primitive primal fears to inhumanity.

Three Muscovites have been hired by an ominous preservation fund via the Internet to save a rare fresco depicting St. Christopher with a hound‘s head for the museum in the abandoned village church. The village and its inhabitants, who are not only outwardly totally run-down, react aggressively to the strangers with their Mercedes bus, their notebooks and mobile phones including social networks. For far too long, the three Muscovites have been thinking of everything as haunting images in the minds of the villagers, who are still socialized by the surveillance state Russia. But their enlightened intellectual view of the world breaks apart piece by piece in contact with this village community, which has degenerated from primitive primal fears to inhumanity.

“A rich, atmospheric American thriller, moved to our native aspen forest, which uses all our Russian phobias… of course the reader is hoodwinked, but extremely clever.“ ST. PETERBURG VEDOMOSTI

Aleksei Nikitin – Victory Park in French

new sale

refresher contract for French edition with Noir sur Blanc

The Ukrainian author Aleksei Nikitin has not only a feel for the raw nerves of a fin de siècle, but also the skill to present his hometown of Kiev ironically and season it with original anecdotes and characters. In VICTORY PARK we learn the names of the villages which occupied the left bank of the Dnepr before the prefab housing blocks began their sprawl in the 1970s; why the soviet housing administration disliked pigeon post and in this did not differ from the German invaders during World War II; and how the rumour of a neglected German army bunker can develop into a real hideout for a neo-Leninist combat unit, who at the end of the novel spark off a final Maidan of the Righteous in Victory park.

Galina Shatalova – Choose your way in Romania

new publication

Romanian translation published by Editura Paralela 45

Inspired by the Hippocratic statement that our food should be our remedies and our remedies our food, Galina Shatalova has developed a concept of natural recovery. Her diet strictly opposes the calorie theory of balanced nutrition, which is contrary to human nature. According to her, the human organism is restricted exclusively to plant foods and does not need more than 250 to 400 calories of daily food intake to maintain its basic metabolism. Everything we eat too much burdens the body and must be „disposed of“ by it. In this book CHOOSE YOUR WAY – METHOD OF HEALING NUTRITION she explains the anatomical and physiological backgrounds of her concept and reports on her experiences during his practical trials.

Aleksei Ivanov – The Food Shack for Italy

new sale

Italian translation rights sold to Voland Edizione

Aleksei Ivanov’s novel THE FOOD SHACK is a very tricky vampire novel about a highly topical ideological conflict that runs through the entire book on many levels: Independence of thought, dreaminess, the urge for freedom and the attempt to understand our complicated world – as a counterpart to the simple answers and blunt rules that have always been and still are set up, out of laziness of thought or just to enslave people. A novel that is not only straightforward and strong like a wooden post, but also follows the rules of the genre so well, that the reader doesn‘t even notice how he has already been bitten and infected.

Serhii Rudenko – Zelenskyi – The Political Biography published

new publications

Georgia, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain

These are the first 5 countries having published Serhii Rudenko’s political Biography of Volodymyr Zelenskyi.

Poznanskie has also published a Ukrainian version for Polish territory. The author will donate his income from this special Ukrainian edition to support Ukraine in war.

The next in row to publish are UK-US/Polity (June) and Germany/Hanser (July).

Sergei Gerasimov – «Notes from Kharkiv» in Hungary and Germany

new sales

Hungarian rights sold to Helikon – German rights sold to dtv

On February 24, 2022, the Russian army launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The city of Kharkiv quickly comes under heavy fire. Hundreds of thousands of people flee. The Ukrainian writer Sergey Gerasimov and his wife together with several cats remain in the embattled frontline town. Soon there will be a lack of clean water, food and medical infrastructure. The thermometers show high sub-zero temperatures, people are freezing. Gerasimov begins to write about the absurdity of everyday life in war. The result is a stirring testimony, an appeal for peace and understanding.

Aleksei Ivanov – The Geographer has drunk the Globe in Italy

new publication

Italian translation published by Voland

In the Russian province of the 90s a young teacher fights with the children of the new generation. He has been assigned to the most rebellious class. The „geography teacher“ and the teenagers, who are ready to break him, first sit in the walls of the classroom, but then outside the walls they together experience an adventure of comradeship and initiation.

„Geographer“ pumps new blood into the channels of emotional perception through literature and lets many readers again – lite- rally as the first time – feel very simple and familiar things: winter, love, wind, trust, lone- liness, the smell of cigarette smoke, the taste of vodka, the headache of a hangover.“ GALINA YUZEFOVICH

Aleksei Fedyarov – Man in Jail with Czarne/Poland

new publication

Polish language edition published by Czarne

Aleksei Fedyarov is not only a public opponent to the Putin regime with his book MAN IN JAIL, he is also a human rights activist and now head of the legal department of the «Rus Sidyashchi» Charity Fund, the only fund that helps Russian prisoners and their families. Olga Romanova, the founder of «Rus Sidyashchi», had to leave Russia for personal safety reasons.

Fedyarov has also written the frightening dystopia SFUMATO which is shrewdly realistic and almost prophetic, with the author drawing on his own knowledge and experience from today’s prison and law enforcement system in Russia.

Russian titles critical of the regime

new special selection

Russian titles critical of the regime

At all times, authors writing in Russian have critically examined the ruling Russian regime, presented, analyzed and questioned the grievances in their own society. And they have not been deterred in recent years as the risk of being targeted has increased. Real authentic literature has always kept itself away from pursuing propagandistic goals. In this respect, it is difficult for me to present a selection from the agency’s titles under the heading „regime-critical“ – as if the other authors and books represented by the agency were uncritical of the regime in the Kremlin.

But because you can’t see it at first glance, and because in unsettling times like these, well-established categories sometimes falter, this SPECIAL SELECTION would like to offer a quick initial orientation. In the end, good literature is about what’s in it, not what’s on it.