Sukhbat Aflatuni – The Adoration of the Magi
An extraordinary family sage covering Russian history from the tsars in the middle of the 19th century through the revolution and the red terror to beyond the soviet era.
Mikhail Odnobibl – The Queue
It is like reading and de-coding a religious icon. After a while the structure of the queue and also the architecture of the town with bi-directional movements, upwards and downwards, reminds one of paintings of The Last Judgment with the protagonist wandering through the circles of hell from which there is no escape.
Leonid Yuzefovich – Winter’s Road
Winner of 2016 National Bestseller Award and Big Book Award. The book was also given the Russian Booker Prize Translation Grant.
In the far east of Siberia, the Yakuts have dared to launch the final uprising against the Red Army. By using this hardly known episode of the Russian Revolution, Yuzefovich is able to portray deeper human motives: the love, passion and individual suffering that are buried in the ideology are revealed and the characters shown to be both oppressor and victim. In the end each individual is responsible for the Russian tragedy.