Drawing on events and situations from the present day, but setting them in a recognizable near future, Living Souls follows the lives of a vast array of characters against the backdrop of a guerrilla conflict in Russian territory between the Northerners’ and the Southerners’ armies, as the indigenous population looks on indifferently.
A complex and ambitious journey through the ills afflicting modern Russia, and at the same time a chillingly prophetic dystopia about imminent ethnic conflicts and the consequent crisis of democracy and liberalism, Bykov’s epic is destined to leave a profound mark on the consciousness of Western readers.
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Living Souls is an epic novel about humankind rather than human individuals. The war he describes is not really over the territory, but over the right to establish a new order, a new ideology.” –
Booknik
“Bykov offers answers to practically all the fundamental Russian questions... A masterful epic novel with a Gogolian wealth of verbal expressiveness and symbolism.” –
Book Review
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Read an excerpt from
Living Souls
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