Paris Yazıları itibaren Doğan Kitap içinde LIT biçim

Stephanie Rolle sknight16 — 4.5

Armando Vega vegawouriyuu — Great story line. This book rekindled my passion to historical fiction. Whenever I hear of Russians - I have always seen them as warriors, people who lived in communism, split things among them on a regular basis and hence lived a happy life. I think I had seen Russia in the eyes of Stalin's believers or non-believers and never in the eyes of a Russian common man. The book gives that view. Its about a girl called Vera - a poor peasant girl- who goes through the second world war in the Soviet Russia. She lost her father to the communist Red Tape, lost her grandmother and sister to the German air bombs, mother and 5 year old son to the starvation imposed by the siege of Leningrad, and at last, her love of her life - her husband, and her daughter, because she thought they were dead! Vera changes her name, her identity and goes to live with an American soldier called Evan. She loves her family, her husband and the two lovely daughters she had, but never ever shows her love to the kids. Come to think of it, its very obvious, how would a mom who has encountered so much sufferings in her life, reveal herself to her daughters? She wants to put that past away from her. But then she cant love her second and third daughter without telling them about the first kid that she had and lost. All the love she had for her husband and her first family - the loss of every single person she loved, had made her feel that its her love that kills people and she doesnt want to show her love openly. She is a warrior - whether fighting to know about her father - who was stamped as the criminal of the country or fighting to marry the man she loved or going behind her children to save them from the enemy's bombs. She must have so much courage to just pull her son around on the sleigh cart to take him to hospitals- not sure if he would live for the next day, but she has to save him. The story also reveals the sufferings that the citizens of Leningrad surfaced in the first winter of the siege. Starvation, death, no place even to bury the bodies, cold, no way to keep them warm; food ration which was very meager and even that food had only uneatable wood shavings or oil cakes; and the enormous sacrifice of the people. Almost 2/3rd of the city died in the first winter, but the remaining 1/3rd lived because, the people who died, gave their last ration or portion of their food to the younger ones to make sure that they live. Vera gets a bottle of wine and bread from a neighbor, who feels that she wont cross to live the next day! Listen it: this is just a neighbor - not even family! Author says, it was not about a real person. It was a story that she wrote by doing a lot of research on the siege period. I cannot believe it. I feel there is a Vera who was living somewhere. or its probably a story of many many Vera's part and parcel of everybody's story! All I have heard about the Siege of Leningrad was that it was the longest in the history and the German's were not ready for the cold winter of Russia and hence they lost the Second World War. But this rosy picture painted by my academic history books are totally wrong! This story proves that it might be a victory for Russia but death for lot of Leningraders - not a real victory. Many people left the city or died, the people who came from other part of the city in the last year got a medal of honor for the bravery of the city!

Mariela Aloma maryaloma — Great story. Would have really liked it, if it had not been read by the author. Yikes.

谢 元林 292824688163fc — I skipped the flashbacks to WWII in this book, b/c I just couldn't get into them, but the rest of the book was really well done, especially the romance between the two main characters. Definitely going to be checking out the other books in this series!

Min Bum kkassanoba1886 — Excellent.