BOTM October I Will Die in a Foreign Land

[Celia]

My Review:
The Ukraine is currently very much in the news. This plus my goal to read as many world books as possible spurred me to read this book NOW.

I knew nothing of the events of 2013 in the Ukraine. My eyes have been opened.

Also, I knew nothing of FEMEN. Once again, eyes are opened.

In this review, I not only intend to describe what was happening in 2013, but also offer some thoughts on how those events relate to current events.

In November 2013, thousands of Ukrainian citizens gathered at Independence Square in Kyiv to protest then-President Yanukovych's failure to sign a referendum with the European Union, opting instead to forge a closer alliance with President Vladimir Putin and Russia. The peaceful protests turned violent when military police shot live ammunition into the crowd, killing over a hundred civilians.

Kalani Pickhart chronicles all of this political intrigue, but chooses to place the focus firmly on her characters, ensuring the book never reads like a history lesson. Though they are embroiled in the turmoil caused by the riots, we also see the enduring nature of the characters' more personal hardships. Each of them is struggling with grief in some way: Misha is an engineer mourning the loss of his wife; Katya is a doctor treating the wounded while contemplating her own son's death; Aleksandr, a former KGB agent, is searching for his long-lost daughter; and Slava is a young activist estranged from her parents after a difficult childhood, now forced to hide her blossoming relationship with another woman due to rampant homophobia. While violence rages around them, each is simply fighting for the chance to be with those they love.

FEMEN: Femen (stylized in all caps; Ukrainian: Фемен) is a radical feminist activist group whose goal is to protect women's rights. The organization became internationally known for organizing controversial, topless protests against sex tourism, religious institutions, sexism, homophobia, and other social, national, and international topics. Founded in Ukraine, the group is now based in France. Femen describes its ideology as being "sextremism, atheism and feminism".

Today's Ukrainian war seems to have a sinister purpose to Putin. He once had the Ukraine under his thumb and Volodymyr Zelenskyy has cut off that thumb, hand and all.

[Gail]

Thank you for this recommendation Celia. I thought it was a great read. I really enjoyed the weave of the Ukrainian version of a Greek chorus (the Kobzari), the news briefs, the cassette recordings and then the straight narratives. I suspect this was not a neutral telling of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, but I learned a huge amount either through the story or by looking up accounts of events in the story. As quoted in the book; Ukraine is an open wound and has been for a very long time. Each of the character's stories are tragic and yet the tone is strangely uplifting. One criticism is that I felt that it tied up all the ends a bit too neatly but I think that was almost the goal of the book, to show that what appears to be unrelated to your everyday is in fact at the core of your being. Great read.

[Celia]

Gail wrote: "Thank you for this recommendation Celia. I thought it was a great read. I really enjoyed the weave of the Ukrainian version of a Greek chorus (the Kobzari), the news briefs, the cassette recordings..."

TY Gail for your insights. As you know, I thought the book very good as well.