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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
An elderly Russian emigrr reminisces about love in the shadow of war in this quietly effective, poignant debut. The opening chapters find the anonymous narrator ensconced in his New York apartment, waxing poetic about his life as a botanist during the siege of Leningrad, as he and his colleagues struggle to save the city's rare collection of plants in the botanical gardens. Deeply in love with his wife, Alena, another botanist, the narrator nonetheless embarks on a series of affairs, with a fellow worker named Lidia and with sexy, exotic Iskra. Both affairs become more difficult and tortured as the siege progresses and the city's population begins to starve. Blackwell wisely steers clear of the horrors that have been chronicled in many previous historical novels. Instead, she offers gemlike observations ("With Alena, who needed neither to find nor to lose herself, sex was only sex") and sensory detail ("one fat, perfect potato in salted water"). The juxtaposition of the gnawing torment of starvation with the narrator's memory of the exotic foods he collected and ate on his travels around the world before the war furnish the novel with many of its tensions and delights. Plotwise, there are some intriguing twists and turns as the war progresses, but the climax is rather tepid, with Blackwell underplaying her narrator's unusual and immoral survival tactics as food becomes increasingly scarce. Still, this is a well-crafted novel that works largely because of its small, evocative moments.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
An unnamed scientist, now safely ensconced in New York City, looks back at the "hunger winter" as German troops surrounded Leningrad in the fall of 1941. In a voice made weary by having seen the worst side of human nature, he describes the 900-day siege that left the city without food and its inhabitants desperate. His own colleagues, all of whom work for an institute that collects rare seeds, split into two groups: those who preserve their principles (including his quiet but steely wife, Alena) and those who use any means available to survive. When the institute's director is incarcerated for political crimes, Alena signs a petition in his defense while her husband begins to pilfer seeds from the collection to assuage his hunger. A man of large appetites, he also comforts himself by recalling his extensive travels before the war, the many exotic foods he sampled, and his numerous infidelities, all the while comparing his wife's brave idealism with his own sneaky pragmatism. Blackwell's debut is a lyrical, haunting story about the cost of survival. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
See all Editorial Reviews
An elderly Russian emigrr reminisces about love in the shadow of war in this quietly effective, poignant debut. The opening chapters find the anonymous narrator ensconced in his New York apartment, waxing poetic about his life as a botanist during the siege of Leningrad, as he and his colleagues struggle to save the city's rare collection of plants in the botanical gardens. Deeply in love with his wife, Alena, another botanist, the narrator nonetheless embarks on a series of affairs, with a fellow worker named Lidia and with sexy, exotic Iskra. Both affairs become more difficult and tortured as the siege progresses and the city's population begins to starve. Blackwell wisely steers clear of the horrors that have been chronicled in many previous historical novels. Instead, she offers gemlike observations ("With Alena, who needed neither to find nor to lose herself, sex was only sex") and sensory detail ("one fat, perfect potato in salted water"). The juxtaposition of the gnawing torment of starvation with the narrator's memory of the exotic foods he collected and ate on his travels around the world before the war furnish the novel with many of its tensions and delights. Plotwise, there are some intriguing twists and turns as the war progresses, but the climax is rather tepid, with Blackwell underplaying her narrator's unusual and immoral survival tactics as food becomes increasingly scarce. Still, this is a well-crafted novel that works largely because of its small, evocative moments.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
An unnamed scientist, now safely ensconced in New York City, looks back at the "hunger winter" as German troops surrounded Leningrad in the fall of 1941. In a voice made weary by having seen the worst side of human nature, he describes the 900-day siege that left the city without food and its inhabitants desperate. His own colleagues, all of whom work for an institute that collects rare seeds, split into two groups: those who preserve their principles (including his quiet but steely wife, Alena) and those who use any means available to survive. When the institute's director is incarcerated for political crimes, Alena signs a petition in his defense while her husband begins to pilfer seeds from the collection to assuage his hunger. A man of large appetites, he also comforts himself by recalling his extensive travels before the war, the many exotic foods he sampled, and his numerous infidelities, all the while comparing his wife's brave idealism with his own sneaky pragmatism. Blackwell's debut is a lyrical, haunting story about the cost of survival. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
See all Editorial Reviews
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