Vera Bogdanova was born in 1986 in Moscow. Raised by her grandmother, she studied English and stayed in New York before beginning to write science fiction texts. In Russia, his first dystopian novel appears in 2021, followed by “Toxic Season for Fetuses”, in 2022, recently published in French by Actes Sud. Vera Bogdanova lives between Moscow and Baku in Azerbaijan.
Novel translated from Russian by Laurence Foulon.
“We are in Russia, the grandmother's dacha is still the refuge of the families of whom Tolstoy spoke, “who are unhappy each in their own way”. Here the parents have seen the Soviet Union disappear and are entitled, instead of a bright future, to wild capitalism and terrorist attacks.
It all began in 1995, Jénia was eleven years old, she was on vacation with her grandmother where her cousin Ilia, who was thirteen, also came. Five years later, they drink alcohol for the first time, ride motorcycles and go clubbing… Five more years and it's the first kiss, the certainty of being made for each other despite all obstacles. Times have changed, but not mentalities, not parents. There is also Dacha, Ilia's little sister, unloved by a devastatingly beautiful mother “who does not know how to choose men” and who, like too many Russian women, will be the victim of domestic violence exacerbated by the alcohol.
An unvarnished portrait of an era, published in 2022, this novel with multiple shades of noir has become the reference for generation Y.” (Presentation of Actes Sud editions)
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