Literature

Ferociously funny and deeply moving, Mother Doll forces us to look at how painful secrets stamp themselves from one generation to the next. Katya Apekina’s second novel is a family epic and a meditation on motherhood, immigration, identity, and war.

A definitive collection of short works by the popular Soviet satirist includes pieces that give expression to the experiences of everyday citizens in the buerecratic leviathin that was the Soviet Union.

The Romanov Brides is a moving and fascinating portrait of two bold and spirited royal sisters, and brings to vivid life imperial Russia—a dazzling, decadent world on the brink of disappearing forever. 

 The Amur River is a shining masterpiece by the acknowledged laureate of travel writing, an urgent lesson in history and the culmination of an astonishing career. 

A Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition of Tolstoy's great Russian epic. Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read

A stunning debut collection of fiction and creative nonfiction— irreverent and unglorified; loving and tender; uncomfortable and inconvenient—by a Ukrainian writer currently fighting for his country in Kyiv

Nearly thirty years after the fall of the USSR, the word "Soviet" should be meaningless. Strangely, though, it endures, former Soviet environs define themselves for or against it. Does that experience mean anything today? This book attempts to find out.

To be a journalist is to tell the truth. I Love Russia is Elena Kostyuchenko’s unrelenting attempt to document her country as experienced by those whom it systematically and brutally erases.

A vivid and illuminating novel about faith, fate, and freedom against the backdrop of 1970s Soviet life, Lost Believers is an unforgettable journey.

Exploring newly available archives that have opened up following the dissolution of the USSR, Curtis draws on new historical documents in order to trace Bulgakov’s life.

In Lenin, Lars T. Lih presents a striking new interpretation of Lenin’s political beliefs and strategies. A vivid, non-ideological portrait, Lenin is an essential look at one of the key figures of modern history.

Bird traces Dostoevsky’s path from his harsh childhood through his years as a political revolutionary and finally to his development into a writer, who fought his battles through the printed word.