With thanks to Pushkin Press and NetGalley UK for a copy of the book in Kindle format in return for an honest review. As an aficionado of European literature, especially French and German, Russian equivalents in translation have frequently disappointed owing to their heavy and often depressing subject matter. In this instance, please step aside Tolstoy, Turgenev and Dostoevsky and make way instead for the heartening, exquisitely descriptive poetic prose of Anna Nerkagi. This is a narrative beautifully rendered into English by Irina Sadovina, allowing a whole new audience to glimpse, albeit briefly, the fragile Nenet way of life in the tundra region. What makes the novel so extra special is its touching Nenet characterisation: the lovelorn Alyoshka struggling with traditional norms and expectations, the old and disconsolate widower Petko abandoned by his daughter and the exploited Khasawa firstly at the mercy of Soviet officialdom and then his own predatory, money grabbing ‘carrion-eating children’. The story considers a wide range of issues including the threat to the continued existence of the population due to the temptations of modernity and external political pressures. It deals poignantly with all aspects of love, loss and grief. Aging with dignity is an another particularly affecting feature and the inevitable associated battle with despair. However, this is by no means an exclusively bleak, all doom and gloom tale as knights in white shining armour do make their appearance effectively in the form of the perpetual wonder of nature and the ever changing seasons. ‘The white moss, the moss of the sun. It shines even in the darkest night’. ‘The sun, leaving its cheek on the edge of the earth, rose every morning for everyone: the orphaned, the crippled, the lonely, the happy and the unhappy’. A shared and fruitful destiny unites a community inspired by hope, surrounded by homely companionship and support, kindling a fire for warmth and, where there is a herd of healthy reindeer, melancholy and poverty dissipate. Where there is light, there is optimism and where there is hope, there resides God. I honestly adored this highly philosophical book!

‘’The heart doesn’t count. The heart is stupid.’’ This is a harsh world we are led into. A frozen land inhabited by people whose hearts have turned to ice, moulded in hardship, isolation and uncertainty. Why is it always our heart that turns to ice so easily? Why do we think that the answer to survival is sacrificing love and desire? Since when do propriety and obedience guarantee survival? Giving voice to the Nenet community of northern Siberia, Anna Nerkagi demonstrates the deepest human emotions and allows us to face the questions and possibly discover the answers. A Herculean task, really. What can be more draining than acknowledging our life has been a bloody waste? ‘’But no. Love flees, taking back its beautiful soul and leaving behind a scraggly skeleton.’’ Alyosha is trapped in a marriage of convenience. The woman he loves has left for the city, having the courage to forge her own fate, according to her will and not in obedience to ancient sets of principles which dictate that the man is far superior to the woman. A woman is treated only a little better than an animal. Equality and choice are unknown words in this community. Her father has denounced her and only Alyosha has remained to weep for her. But how hard it is to weep for someone who hasn’t died but simply left, not considering you reason enough to stay. His mother thinks that producing children is the sole purpose of his existence, so that the lineage doesn’t die, so that the people keep on perpetuating this sorrowful existence. ‘’The loon weeps for what has been. But when it starts to wail on the shore in the middle of a clear day, it annoys people with its pathetic, terrible cry.’’ It’s a hard review I have to write, I confess. As hard as the convictions permeating the narrative which find me in absolute disagreement. How can I find it in my heart to sympathise with mothers who exercise the worst kind of emotional dictatorship over their children? For men who think that a woman’s mind is simply not able, let alone worthy, to question and understand? Yes, the writing is extremely beautiful. It is poetic, reads like a fable, and very often veers into the philosophical. It both kept me at a distance and brought me closer as my feelings of rage and loathing were boiling. The heartache and the injustice jump out of every page, and it was too much to bear at times. Duty. Duty. Duty. What about love? What about trust? What about choice? Why is a person coerced into compromising into a life that will make them miserable just because family, religion or nation demand it? Think of it and let us all think of our lives and our choices. I am certain we won’t be able to face the answers most of us are willing to suppress. Hide and obey. Stay within a convenient, safe, religion-accepted, socially-demanded, utterly proper, meaningless life. No fire. No desire. No soul. Herd your cows. Breed. Eat and die. Human waste. What a sad existence. It’s a quick read, beautiful and demanding. Even though the writing style and the characters didn’t resonate with me, even though the language became too flowery in parts, in my opinion, without purpose, even though the plot is almost non-existent, you need to read it to come into contact with people who live in a universe of their own. Isolated. Forgotten. Voiceless. And this state of unwilling inertia gives birth to cruelty. Read it to face questions that you might be terrified to address. Read it to witness the human hypocrisy in all its rotten glory. ‘’If life was a journey, then what was love? And why was his soul aching with love?’’

A beautifully written story that offers a peek into the lives, customs and beliefs of the Indigenous Nenets community of Northern Siberia. The story is an exploration of love and yearning, especially when it isn’t reciprocated. It’s also an insight into grief for both those who have passed on, as well as those who are still alive but have forgotten about their loved ones. Told in multiple POVs, we follow a short period of time in the lives of both male and female characters of different generations, and how they handle certain conflicts. We meet Alyoshka, who is trapped in a marriage of convenience, after waiting and yearning for the return of Ilne, his first and only love, daughter of Old Man Petko, another member of this small community. Old Man Petko is grieving the loss of his wife and is battling loneliness after his daughter hasn't returned in many years. Vanu is another elder of this group and is concerned for Petko, who lives with him and his wife. They are later joined by Khasawa and his mute daughter after struggling for years. His story was meticulously presented and it was heartbreaking. It somehow encompassed all the other characters' struggles, but his grief and pain were explored on a deeper level. What I found interesting was that the only characters that were named were the men and the absent daughter of Petko, Ilne. The other ones were only referred to as the mother, the young girl or wife, the mute daughter and the Lamdo woman. The men were the providers of the family, but the women were the strong arms that kept up their tents and hence lives. The stocked fires, set the table and brought out tea and meat and drinks; mended the tents and clothes. It was an interesting observation of the impact these women had on the men's lives, even though they weren't deemed to be named throughout the book. A short but impactful book, that both saddened and warmed my heart, at the same time.

I really enjoyed this book. It’s a journey into the tundra and into the lives of the nomadic Nenets community in Russia. It took me a few chapters to get used to the writing style, especially because at the beginning it shifts frequently between different characters’ points of view, and I had a hard time getting a clear sense of the camp and the people in it. But once I got to know the characters, it felt really special to get this glimpse into their lives. It is a hard life — harsh at times — but also, in some ways, simple and grounded. So different, yet the emotional struggles feel in many ways familiar. The writing is beautiful. I found it difficult to read about the gender hierarchy embedded in these traditions, especially when the women were clearly central to daily life, yet treated without the same authority and respect as the men around them. Still, it is a story about perseverance and learning to face the reality of the life in front of you.

This was such a thought provoking read, although it’s a quick read, there was so much to think about and learn from it. It was interesting to learn about the Nenet people and how they lived and their views around ‘life’ their traditions and culture. The characters were all different and we saw different personalities/troubles they faced. My favourite parts were the folk tales.