10 books about Ukraine, from nonfiction to novels : NPR

at kramers, an independent bookstore in washington, d.c., many books on russia and ukraine were sold out. Books began disappearing from shelves a little over a week ago as the world braced for a Russian invasion of Ukraine, general manager llalan fowler said.

“People have definitely been picking up more Russian books, like Putin people and that kind of title,” he told npr. “many of the books we have available about ukraine and russia and their relationship and history are already out of stock at our supplier.”

You are reading: Best books on ukraine

many customers walk into the store knowing what they want, he said. But if you’re not sure what to look for first, here’s a roundup of books on Ukraine that you can dive into.

i will die in a foreign land, by kalani pickhart

pickhart’s first novel is on fowler’s to-read list. named among the new york public library’s best books of 2021, i will die in a foreign land, chronicling the ukrainian protests of 2013 and 2014, when protesters pushed for closer ties with nato and the european union. /p>

pickhart told kjzz’s “the show” last month that the book garnered more attention as tensions between Russia and Ukraine escalated.

“I think a lot of people are looking for more information and to understand the conflict in a digestible way, essentially trying to get a sense of the emotional movement of what’s going on,” Pickhart said.

lucky breaks, by yevgenia belorusets

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a fictional book about the list of hunters, lucky breaks, translated from Russian by Eugene Ostashevsky, is a collection of short stories about women living after the war in Ukraine. belorusets, a Ukrainian writer, focuses on everyday life: a florist, a cosmetologist, a card player, among others.

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hip hop ukraine: music, race and african migration, by adriana helbig

Helbig, who chairs the music department at the University of Pittsburgh, watched African musicians rap in Ukrainian during the Orange Revolution in 2004. The revolution followed a presidential election, which many claimed was corrupt and fraudulent.

through ethnographic investigation of music, media and politics, helbig’s book delves into the world of urban music, hip hop parties and dance competitions, along with interracial encounters between immigrants Africans and the local population.

Jews and Ukrainians on Russia’s Literary Frontier: From the Shtetl Fair to the Petersburg Bookstore, by Amelia Glaser

Covering much of the 19th century and part of the 20th century in Ukraine, this book explores how those who worked and wrote in Russian, Ukrainian, and Yiddish communicated and collaborated in places like fairs and trade markets. Glaser’s study seeks to show that Eastern European literature was much more than a single language and culture.

red famine: stalin’s war against ukraine, by anne applebaum

this book delves into the famine in ukraine created by joseph stalin in the early 1930s, when he sought to destroy the ukrainian national movement. Nearly 4 million Ukrainians were killed and many were arrested by the Soviet secret police.

on npr fresh air, applebaum, a historian and journalist who writes about the war in ukraine for the atlantic, explained how vladimir putin and stalin viewed ukraine in a similar way: “as a vector of ideas that could undermine or threaten him.”

midnight in chernobyl, by adam higginbotham

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higginbotham, a journalist, spent years investigating the aftermath of the chernobyl nuclear disaster. in his book, he delves into the design flaws and Soviet secrecy that contributed to the explosion, as well as the efforts to contain the damage. he spoke outdoors about the novel in 2019.

death and the penguin, by andrey kurkov

Set in kyiv, this 1966 novel tells the story of Viktor, a man who dreams of becoming a novelist, and his pet penguin Misha.

viktor finds a job writing obituaries for people who haven’t died yet, but his obituaries seem to become a kind of blacklist: the people he writes about start getting killed. kurkov spoke to fresh air about the book in 2012.

borderland: a journey through the history of ukraine, by anna reid

Reid’s book takes readers back centuries, including the Mongol invasion in 1240 and the Nazi occupation in 1900, which led to the country’s independence in 1991, when the Soviet Union fell. The book recounts Reid’s own experiences as a reporter in Kyiv, as well as the voices of peasants, politicians, and survivors of Stalin’s famine and Nazi labor camps.

the gates of europe: a history of ukraine, by serhii plokhy

In this 2015 book, Plokhy explores Ukraine’s ongoing quest for identity and independence. Because the region serves as a strategic connector between East and West, many groups have historically fought for supremacy on this piece of land, including the Romans, the Ottomans, the Third Reich, and the Soviet Union. plokhy uses these historical conflicts to gain insight into ongoing conflicts and the quest for Ukrainian sovereignty.

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babi yar: document in the form of a novel, from a. anatoly (kuznetsov)

when the germans occupied kyiv in 1941, kuznetsov was 12 years old and living in the ukrainian capital. the teenager witnessed Nazi war crimes committed against Jews, Roma, Ukrainian nationalists, and Soviet prisoners of war. he began documenting what he saw when he was 14 years old, then supplemented his writings with testimonies from eyewitnesses and survivors.

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