A Terrible Country: A Novel
“Hilarious. . . . To understand Russia, read A Terrible Country.”
—Time
"This artful and autumnal novel, published in high summer, is a gift to those who wish to receive it."
—Dwight Garner, The New York Times
"Hilarious, heartbreaking . . . A Terrible Country may be one of the best books you'll read this year."
—Ann Levin, Associated Press
A New York Times Editors' Choice
Named a Best Book of 2018 by Bookforum, Nylon, Esquire, and Vulture
A literary triumph about Russia, family, love, and loyalty—from a founding editor of n+1 and the author of Raising Raffi
When Andrei Kaplan’s older brother Dima insists that Andrei return to Moscow to care for their ailing grandmother, Andrei must take stock of his life in New York. His girlfriend has stopped returning his text messages. His dissertation adviser is dubious about his job prospects. It’s the summer of 2008, and his bank account is running dangerously low. Perhaps a few months in Moscow are just what he needs. So Andrei sublets his room in Brooklyn, packs up his hockey stuff, and moves into the apartment that Stalin himself had given his grandmother, a woman who has outlived her husband and most of her friends. She survived the dark days of communism and witnessed Russia’s violent capitalist transformation, during which she lost her beloved dacha. She welcomes Andrei into her home, even if she can’t always remember who he is.
Andrei learns to navigate Putin’s Moscow, still the city of his birth, but with more expensive coffee. He looks after his elderly—but surprisingly sharp!—grandmother, finds a place to play hockey, a café to send emails, and eventually some friends, including a beautiful young activist named Yulia. Over the course of the year, his grandmother’s health declines and his feelings of dislocation from both Russia and America deepen. Andrei knows he must reckon with his future and make choices that will determine his life and fate. When he becomes entangled with a group of leftists, Andrei’s politics and his allegiances are tested, and he is forced to come to terms with the Russian society he was born into and the American one he has enjoyed since he was a kid.
A wise, sensitive novel about Russia, exile, family, love, history and fate, A Terrible County asks what you owe the place you were born, and what it owes you. Writing with grace and humor, Keith Gessen gives us a brilliant and mature novel that is sure to mark him as one of the most talented novelists of his generation.
—Time
"This artful and autumnal novel, published in high summer, is a gift to those who wish to receive it."
—Dwight Garner, The New York Times
"Hilarious, heartbreaking . . . A Terrible Country may be one of the best books you'll read this year."
—Ann Levin, Associated Press
A New York Times Editors' Choice
Named a Best Book of 2018 by Bookforum, Nylon, Esquire, and Vulture
A literary triumph about Russia, family, love, and loyalty—from a founding editor of n+1 and the author of Raising Raffi
When Andrei Kaplan’s older brother Dima insists that Andrei return to Moscow to care for their ailing grandmother, Andrei must take stock of his life in New York. His girlfriend has stopped returning his text messages. His dissertation adviser is dubious about his job prospects. It’s the summer of 2008, and his bank account is running dangerously low. Perhaps a few months in Moscow are just what he needs. So Andrei sublets his room in Brooklyn, packs up his hockey stuff, and moves into the apartment that Stalin himself had given his grandmother, a woman who has outlived her husband and most of her friends. She survived the dark days of communism and witnessed Russia’s violent capitalist transformation, during which she lost her beloved dacha. She welcomes Andrei into her home, even if she can’t always remember who he is.
Andrei learns to navigate Putin’s Moscow, still the city of his birth, but with more expensive coffee. He looks after his elderly—but surprisingly sharp!—grandmother, finds a place to play hockey, a café to send emails, and eventually some friends, including a beautiful young activist named Yulia. Over the course of the year, his grandmother’s health declines and his feelings of dislocation from both Russia and America deepen. Andrei knows he must reckon with his future and make choices that will determine his life and fate. When he becomes entangled with a group of leftists, Andrei’s politics and his allegiances are tested, and he is forced to come to terms with the Russian society he was born into and the American one he has enjoyed since he was a kid.
A wise, sensitive novel about Russia, exile, family, love, history and fate, A Terrible County asks what you owe the place you were born, and what it owes you. Writing with grace and humor, Keith Gessen gives us a brilliant and mature novel that is sure to mark him as one of the most talented novelists of his generation.
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Community Reviews
thenextgoodbook.com
A Terrible Country by Keith Gessen
What’s it about?
This novel follows Andrei from the United States to Russia. Andrei is an aspiring academic specializing in Russian Literature. As no career prospects are panning out, he answers his older brother's call to come to Russia and help take care of his 90 year old grandmother for a short time. We watch Andrei try to assimilate into a very new Russia.
What did it make me think about?
Why have I not heard more about this book? I have read so many books on the Soviet Union, but not many on life in Russia more recently. This fictional novel was a fascinating glimpse into a country that seems to always be striving towards a new type of society.
Should I read it?
I highly recommend this book and am very surprised that it has not garnered more attention. The characters are magnificent and it is a novel that is illuminating as well as thought provoking. Plus Keith Gessen writes with a deadpan style that allows his humor to shine- and I always love that. This one will be high on my list for 2019. Nice to start the year out with such a good book!
Quote-
“His parents had come from the Soviet Union, as mine had, and at around the same time. Like many of us, he’d grown up speaking Russian, and like many of us he’d inherited his parents’ ambivalence toward the country they’d escaped. Our parents had been so skeptical of Russia, so fearful of the Russians, that they had uprooted their lives, put everything in boxes, and gone to the post office dozens of times to ship their books to America, just to get away. But they also remained bound to Russia by a million ties of memory and habit and affection. They watched Russian movies, shopped at Russian stores, and preferred Russian candy.”
“More to the point, would I be able to stay in Moscow indefinitely? On the one hand it was appealing. I didn’t care that much about good coffee. And I liked the food. But the daily grind of life was something else. Just to do anything, to get my skates sharpened, to get a library book-to get from one part of the city to another- was an unbelievable hassle. What in New York took twenty minutes, here took an hour. What in New York took an hour, here took pretty much all day. It wore you down. The frowns on the faces of the people wore you down. The lies on the television too, after awhile, wore you down.”
A Terrible Country by Keith Gessen
What’s it about?
This novel follows Andrei from the United States to Russia. Andrei is an aspiring academic specializing in Russian Literature. As no career prospects are panning out, he answers his older brother's call to come to Russia and help take care of his 90 year old grandmother for a short time. We watch Andrei try to assimilate into a very new Russia.
What did it make me think about?
Why have I not heard more about this book? I have read so many books on the Soviet Union, but not many on life in Russia more recently. This fictional novel was a fascinating glimpse into a country that seems to always be striving towards a new type of society.
Should I read it?
I highly recommend this book and am very surprised that it has not garnered more attention. The characters are magnificent and it is a novel that is illuminating as well as thought provoking. Plus Keith Gessen writes with a deadpan style that allows his humor to shine- and I always love that. This one will be high on my list for 2019. Nice to start the year out with such a good book!
Quote-
“His parents had come from the Soviet Union, as mine had, and at around the same time. Like many of us, he’d grown up speaking Russian, and like many of us he’d inherited his parents’ ambivalence toward the country they’d escaped. Our parents had been so skeptical of Russia, so fearful of the Russians, that they had uprooted their lives, put everything in boxes, and gone to the post office dozens of times to ship their books to America, just to get away. But they also remained bound to Russia by a million ties of memory and habit and affection. They watched Russian movies, shopped at Russian stores, and preferred Russian candy.”
“More to the point, would I be able to stay in Moscow indefinitely? On the one hand it was appealing. I didn’t care that much about good coffee. And I liked the food. But the daily grind of life was something else. Just to do anything, to get my skates sharpened, to get a library book-to get from one part of the city to another- was an unbelievable hassle. What in New York took twenty minutes, here took an hour. What in New York took an hour, here took pretty much all day. It wore you down. The frowns on the faces of the people wore you down. The lies on the television too, after awhile, wore you down.”
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