Along the way the two sisters confront differences that shadowed them have throughout their childhoods and Nadia learns for the first time of the wartime events that contributed to the very different worldviews she and her sister hold, finally realizing the privilege she has enjoyed as her parents’ “precious peacetime baby.

A másik viszont még csak most akar bevándorolni, a perifériáról áttenné székhelyét a centrumba, hogy ott zsákmányolják ki.In a BBC Bookclub interview, the author mentioned that some reviewers of the Ukrainian translation were hostile, seeing it as an attack on their country. The other touch I admired was the way the family's past ordeals in Ukraine are introduced often quite obliquely, hinted at rather than fully drawn, and are the more haunting for that. What I really enjoyed about writing this book is being able to put all those unacceptable thoughts into words: the rows and arguments, the uninhibited bitchiness with which the sisters accost Valentina and each other, the sheer brutality with which Valentina abuses the old man, and the old man’s unbridled dottiness. The quick synopsis of the plot is this: Gold-digging Ukrainian immigrant hussy latches on to an elderly Ukrainian widower in England, marries him, and tries to take his money and his house. Nikolai and Ludmilla, parents to sisters Nadezhda (our narrator) and Vera (Big Sister), were originally from Ukraine, surviving through wars, communism, concentration camps, Stalin's totalitarian reign, etcetera.

And there were photographs—they must have scanned them in—of my grandparents whom I had never met, of aunts, uncles, cousins—there are dozens of them over there! The author accomplishes it well by always pointing out the other side of the story, the other point of view, the alternate take on the events.

It was, however, a portrayal of the ridiculousness of the green card process (if the amount of marriages bought with the sole purpose of citizenship is any indication) and the inherent obstacles in immigrating here that took a comical rather than serious angle, making this, overall, a short, lighthearted read. Q. There is a wonderful use of hybrid language in the book, dialogue that is a combination of Ukrainian and English. Narrated by a middle-aged sociology professor Nadezhda, this is a story of her small British family of Ukrainian immigrants which thrown into utter chaos by an unexpected arrival of a Ukrainian bombshell-tart Valentina, she of short denim skirts, high-heeled mules, Botticellian breasts, and an infamous green satin bra.

It was first performed at Hull Truck Theatre from the 22nd September to 14th October 2017 as part of the celebrations for Hull’s year as City of Culture. A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian also aims to be at least partially a presentation of Ukrainian history - published in a Western country and aimed towards a Western audience, and one which doesn't know much about the country (though with current events taking place there we've seen a sudden and amazing increase in experts on all things Ukraine - most of whom probably couldn't find it on the map a few months before). A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian , Two Caravans and Marina's third and fourth novels, We Are All Made of Glue , Various Pets Alive and Dead and The Lubetkin Legacy are all available in Penguin. But like many immigrants, my parents believed that hard work and education were the keys to success in our new world. It felt like paint-by-numbers noveling: take a fucked up family, add some culturally sensitive and upsetting history, intersperse it with a quirky thing one of them does.Q. The sections of the book on tractors offer both technical information and a history that verges on poetry.