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Petropolis
Sasha Goldberg is the ultimate outsider: she's a chubby, biracial Jewish girl from the Siberian town of Asbestos 2. Her father takes off for the United States, and leaves Sasha to navigate adolescence in a bleak apartment bloc with her overbearing mother. Sasha falls in love with an art school drop-out who lives inside a concrete pipe in the town dump. Following her heart gets her into trouble at home, so she flees Russia as a mail-order bride and lands in suburban Arizona. Sasha manages to escape her Red Lobster-loving fiancé and embarks on a misadventure-filled journey across America in search of her father.
Anya Ulinich has crafted an unforgettable story of familial fault lines, cross-cultural confusion, and the beguiling allure of new beginnings. Petropolis is a funny and poignant debut marking the arrival of a major new voice in fiction.
364 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
23 people are currently reading
1240 people want to read
About the author
Anya Ulinich
3 books64 followersAnya Ulinich grew up in Moscow, Russia, and immigrated to Arizona when she was seventeen. She holds an MFA in visual arts from the University of California, Davis. She is the author of the novels Petropolis (Viking, 2007), and Lena Finkle’s Magic Barrel, a graphic novel (Penguin, 2014). Ulinich’s short stories and essays have appeared in The New York Times, Zoetrope: All-Story, n+1, and PEN America Journal. She teaches writing at the New School and has taught at NYU and Gotham Writer’s Workshop. She lives in Brooklyn with her two daughters.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 196 reviews
April 10, 2015
Great! Loved it!
I read this a long time ago ....I had given it 4 stars....
I was WRONG! (I had posted 4 --wrote no review).
I've come back to rate it 5 stars! I can remember this book like yesterday.
I knew 'nothing' about it when our Jewish book club picked it...(our Rabbi picked it)...
Reading a book --that you know nothing about --discovering its hilarious -weird-sad-weird-funny-weird-hilarious-sad--DIFFERENT-- ABSOLUTELY delightful 'can't-put-down' reading.... is PURE JOY!
Why more people have not read and raved about this book --I have no idea!
"Sasha Goldberg is a like Borat, but with a Big Heart", says Gary Shteyngart
After losing her father, her boyfriend, and her baby, Sasha Goldberg decides that getting herself to the United States is the surest path to deliverance. She grits her teeth and signs up for a mail-order bridal service. But she finds that life in suburban Phoenix with her Red Lobster -loving fiance isn't much better than life in Siberia. so she takes off across America.
Many unexpected connections ...
Its a wonderful -*treat-read*- tragicomic story ---
Genuinely Moving!!!
I read this a long time ago ....I had given it 4 stars....
I was WRONG! (I had posted 4 --wrote no review).
I've come back to rate it 5 stars! I can remember this book like yesterday.
I knew 'nothing' about it when our Jewish book club picked it...(our Rabbi picked it)...
Reading a book --that you know nothing about --discovering its hilarious -weird-sad-weird-funny-weird-hilarious-sad--DIFFERENT-- ABSOLUTELY delightful 'can't-put-down' reading.... is PURE JOY!
Why more people have not read and raved about this book --I have no idea!
"Sasha Goldberg is a like Borat, but with a Big Heart", says Gary Shteyngart
After losing her father, her boyfriend, and her baby, Sasha Goldberg decides that getting herself to the United States is the surest path to deliverance. She grits her teeth and signs up for a mail-order bridal service. But she finds that life in suburban Phoenix with her Red Lobster -loving fiance isn't much better than life in Siberia. so she takes off across America.
Many unexpected connections ...
Its a wonderful -*treat-read*- tragicomic story ---
Genuinely Moving!!!
July 17, 2013
Petropolis tries very hard to be dark and satirical and paint a picture of America and Russia that is both brutal and touching. It partly succeeds, in that there were many moments in the book that I thought perfectly conveyed the grimness of living in impoverished post-Soviet Russia, and the grimness of living as an outsider in the "land of opportunity" when you have no status and are reliant on the strings-attached charity of those who always have more money and power than you. Russia and America can both be grim places for anyone who is "Other" (as the main character, an overweight black Jewish girl from Siberia is in both countries). But Petropolis is not really a tragedy -- Sasha's life is sometimes depressing and sometimes funny, and Ulinich pokes fun at the foibles of her country of birth and her adopted country. She gets the details so right sometimes, and there are moments of real poignancy. But the humor falls flat, the satire is neither biting nor clever enough to make this book really stand out as a literary masterpiece to me. So in the end, it's a decent story about a Russian immigrant and her journey from Siberia to Arizona to Chicago to New York, and her relations with her family and friends (a cast as eclectic and mixed as she is).
I guess my ambivalence about this book is reflected in the three stars. It was good, the writing was occasionally stand-out in its literary detail and especially in the characters and their appearances and the thoughts running through Sasha's head... and yet somewhere it just fell flat for me. The ending seemed wrapped up a little too neatly, I never fully engaged with the main character, and the satire didn't quite connect with me. I suspect a Russian immigrant, someone who shares both the author and the main character's background, would get a lot of the nuances (and humor) that I missed. Added to that is the fact that this was an unusual selection for me, not the sort of book I usually read to begin with, and it wasn't quite compelling enough to make me say, "Yeah, I want to read more like this." Did I enjoy it enough to finish it? Yes. Am I likely to seek out other books by this author, or books with similar themes? No, not really.
I guess my ambivalence about this book is reflected in the three stars. It was good, the writing was occasionally stand-out in its literary detail and especially in the characters and their appearances and the thoughts running through Sasha's head... and yet somewhere it just fell flat for me. The ending seemed wrapped up a little too neatly, I never fully engaged with the main character, and the satire didn't quite connect with me. I suspect a Russian immigrant, someone who shares both the author and the main character's background, would get a lot of the nuances (and humor) that I missed. Added to that is the fact that this was an unusual selection for me, not the sort of book I usually read to begin with, and it wasn't quite compelling enough to make me say, "Yeah, I want to read more like this." Did I enjoy it enough to finish it? Yes. Am I likely to seek out other books by this author, or books with similar themes? No, not really.
January 8, 2008
(My full review of this book is much longer than GoodReads' word-count limitations. Find the entire essay at the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com].)
It's no secret that I'm a fan of novels that use international travel as the core of their story; and one of the reasons I like such books, as is the case with a lot of other fans of the genre, is that it gives a smart author a great opportunity to examine the various cultures that exist around the world, the various sets of societal norms and traditions that exist from place to place and that profoundly make us who we are. What does it say about us, then, when we choose to pack up and move out of the environment in which we grew up, to move halfway across the world into a culture we barely understand? How does that inform you and make you a better citizen of that new place, and how does that clash with the normalization process and make you a worser citizen? And, especially important in the case of those to emigrate to America, can you really make such a move and retain 100 percent of what your "old self" was? Must you take on some of the bad traits that exist about Americans when you choose to live here, when you choose to take advantage of the benefits of being an American?
And pow, out of left field it seems, we have out now one of the better books I've ever read on the subject, the supremely funny and horrifying Petropolis, by Russian-American smartypants immigrant Anya Ulinich. It is not just a detailed look at what most travel novels are about, which is the specific culture our hero is leaving behind (small-town Siberia in this case), but also a laser-precise look at America as well -- from desolate Arizona to the working-class neighborhoods of Chicago, to the Jewish retirement communities of low-rent Brooklyn -- told with a vicious realism that only someone from another country can even see, much less get away with. It will make you laugh uproariously, and it will make you weep uncontrollably; not only a bleak look at what exactly "survival" means to so many people around the world, but also how a person can manage to maintain a sense of fun and awe about the world at the same time. And surprisingly enough, it's more American as well than a lot of books written by native-born Americans; a book full of sophisticated humor concerning the American culture and spirit, jokes that you have to have lived in America your whole life to even get.
More specifically, it's the story of Sasha Goldberg, an overweight, clumsy, black Russian Jew (yeah, I know), living in...
It's no secret that I'm a fan of novels that use international travel as the core of their story; and one of the reasons I like such books, as is the case with a lot of other fans of the genre, is that it gives a smart author a great opportunity to examine the various cultures that exist around the world, the various sets of societal norms and traditions that exist from place to place and that profoundly make us who we are. What does it say about us, then, when we choose to pack up and move out of the environment in which we grew up, to move halfway across the world into a culture we barely understand? How does that inform you and make you a better citizen of that new place, and how does that clash with the normalization process and make you a worser citizen? And, especially important in the case of those to emigrate to America, can you really make such a move and retain 100 percent of what your "old self" was? Must you take on some of the bad traits that exist about Americans when you choose to live here, when you choose to take advantage of the benefits of being an American?
And pow, out of left field it seems, we have out now one of the better books I've ever read on the subject, the supremely funny and horrifying Petropolis, by Russian-American smartypants immigrant Anya Ulinich. It is not just a detailed look at what most travel novels are about, which is the specific culture our hero is leaving behind (small-town Siberia in this case), but also a laser-precise look at America as well -- from desolate Arizona to the working-class neighborhoods of Chicago, to the Jewish retirement communities of low-rent Brooklyn -- told with a vicious realism that only someone from another country can even see, much less get away with. It will make you laugh uproariously, and it will make you weep uncontrollably; not only a bleak look at what exactly "survival" means to so many people around the world, but also how a person can manage to maintain a sense of fun and awe about the world at the same time. And surprisingly enough, it's more American as well than a lot of books written by native-born Americans; a book full of sophisticated humor concerning the American culture and spirit, jokes that you have to have lived in America your whole life to even get.
More specifically, it's the story of Sasha Goldberg, an overweight, clumsy, black Russian Jew (yeah, I know), living in...
February 8, 2008
Well, I always think i have a weakness for books about Russian immigrants, Russian-Americans, or other Eastern Europeans in America. However, i've noticed a trend lately among contemporary novels written by Young Russian Immigrants or Young Americans of Russian Descent. The trend consists of books that try so hard to be satirical, lovingly mocking both Russian and American culture, while also trying to hard to be _current_ and capture minute details of contemporary pop culture so perfectly, that they end up... well... shall i say... _slight_?
What i mean is, they get caught up in the irony and the details and what is lost in return is any sense of depth, heft, beauty, artful storytelling, or the ability to move the reader. This is actually pretty sad, because i actually _like_ the mockery, the satire, but not at the expense of overall quality of the novel itself. Unfortunately, it is rare that i see the perfect combination of the humor and the depth. So far, Jonathan Safran Foer has come the closest. Anya Ulinich's Petropolis, which i had such high hopes for and was perhaps a little too excited to read, falls short.
The writing is not terrible, in fact, in places it is quite comical, and in others it is rather poignant, for fleeting moments, but overall, it felt like it was trying a little too hard to be funny and ironic, a little too hard to be contemporary and hip, and not hard enough to present the whole package well. Overall i found the tone inconsistent - the first half delights in ironic names and details (e.g. the main character's hometown "Asbestos 2"), while the second half is just sad and serious. My suspension of disbelief was often broken by unrealistic-seeming dialogue or emotional descriptions, as well as the presence of some of my literary pet-peeves (seemingly unnecessary descriptions of things like masturbation and getting high. perhaps i'm just a literary prude).
This book reminded me a bit of "The Russian Debutante's Handbook" - funny at first, promising a light and entertaining read, but then becoming less funny, the character becoming less sympathetic or interesting, and the story becoming less believable, as it went on.
I do think i'm making the book sound worse than it is. There were certainly parts that were fun to read, and i do admit i delighted in some of the details that only one raised surrounded by both Russian and American culture could fully delight in. Some of the details she captures about Russian parents were entirely spot on (resulting in several of those moments when i thought "OH! its not just MY crazy parents who say that!"). If Goodreads had "half" ratings, i'd have given this book 2 1/2 stars rather than 2. But, i think my overall disappointment, and the feeling that there was potential for so much more, keeps it from a 3.
Part of my problem may be what i call "cormac mccarthy syndrome." Once you've read writing like his, which can sometimes only be described as "painfully beautiful," it becomes close to impossible for any, especially contemporary, author to compare.
Now i'm on to finally read The Road to make up for this. Let's hope it doesnt disappoint.
What i mean is, they get caught up in the irony and the details and what is lost in return is any sense of depth, heft, beauty, artful storytelling, or the ability to move the reader. This is actually pretty sad, because i actually _like_ the mockery, the satire, but not at the expense of overall quality of the novel itself. Unfortunately, it is rare that i see the perfect combination of the humor and the depth. So far, Jonathan Safran Foer has come the closest. Anya Ulinich's Petropolis, which i had such high hopes for and was perhaps a little too excited to read, falls short.
The writing is not terrible, in fact, in places it is quite comical, and in others it is rather poignant, for fleeting moments, but overall, it felt like it was trying a little too hard to be funny and ironic, a little too hard to be contemporary and hip, and not hard enough to present the whole package well. Overall i found the tone inconsistent - the first half delights in ironic names and details (e.g. the main character's hometown "Asbestos 2"), while the second half is just sad and serious. My suspension of disbelief was often broken by unrealistic-seeming dialogue or emotional descriptions, as well as the presence of some of my literary pet-peeves (seemingly unnecessary descriptions of things like masturbation and getting high. perhaps i'm just a literary prude).
This book reminded me a bit of "The Russian Debutante's Handbook" - funny at first, promising a light and entertaining read, but then becoming less funny, the character becoming less sympathetic or interesting, and the story becoming less believable, as it went on.
I do think i'm making the book sound worse than it is. There were certainly parts that were fun to read, and i do admit i delighted in some of the details that only one raised surrounded by both Russian and American culture could fully delight in. Some of the details she captures about Russian parents were entirely spot on (resulting in several of those moments when i thought "OH! its not just MY crazy parents who say that!"). If Goodreads had "half" ratings, i'd have given this book 2 1/2 stars rather than 2. But, i think my overall disappointment, and the feeling that there was potential for so much more, keeps it from a 3.
Part of my problem may be what i call "cormac mccarthy syndrome." Once you've read writing like his, which can sometimes only be described as "painfully beautiful," it becomes close to impossible for any, especially contemporary, author to compare.
Now i'm on to finally read The Road to make up for this. Let's hope it doesnt disappoint.
August 5, 2015
Remarkable
January 6, 2011
What the heck, FIVE STARS! Eh, maybe 4.5 stars. I could not put this book down despite the Siberian chill it put in my bones. The writing is exquisite. Although some who read this may see its category (Russian/American Jewish young emigre writers of the 21st century) more than the book itself, it bears looking at on its own merits. That said, it's hard not to draw parallels. This may be the most "Soviet" thing I've ever read, including Absurdistan by Gary Shteyngart. The book is not so much an overt satire, as Shteyngart's works are. Ulinich provides a more subtle criticism of both Soviet and American cultures, one that seems more a biproduct of the narrative rather than a goal in itself. I was also fascinated by the way in which her protagonist was rendered as both a sympathetic character and also a brute -- a much more nuanced treatment than Shteyngart gives to his main characters, who he also tends to paint as crude lovable disgusting oafs.
August 9, 2011
This book kinda reiterates a general rule of thumb with me and Russians - tread lightly. They grow up in the land of broken if they're growing up in Siberia. Government, pipes, houses, spirits-you name it, broken and nothing to mend them. There's no whining though, there's acceptance and later craftiness and than above all, and intense resourcefulness. Guess that's where the crafty starts ro really take off. Lucky for us Sasha, born and raised in Asbestos2 in SIberia, also brings to the table the ability to be wry, sardonic and blunt. Jewish and half-black, with only a child's memory of her father, she sets off to local Art School, Moscow, Kupid Korner and landing finally in the U.S.. Various debacles are thrown at Sasha and she just bats them away and moving on, looking simply for better.
I have to say I was rooting for her the whole time.
I love this sentence:
"The Americans in line have toothbrushes and travel-sized tubes of toothpaste, the Russians have bloodshot eyes and unbridled fury.
I have to say I was rooting for her the whole time.
I love this sentence:
"The Americans in line have toothbrushes and travel-sized tubes of toothpaste, the Russians have bloodshot eyes and unbridled fury.
December 11, 2007
This book was cool. It's written by a pretty young Russian emigrant in English. So you gotta give the author credit for pulling it off right there.
Aside from that, it's generally really well-written--Ulnich has fun with language and there a lot of really great/amusing sentences.
The plot is a bit over-reaching--a bit slow in the beginning and a bit over-the-top in the middle and the end. The traditional romantic storybook ending is tempered some by our heroine's choice of lover.
The plot is your basic chubby biracial Jewish girl goes to Moscow to make it big, and ends up a mail order bride/domestic slave in search of a father in the US and finds love with a wheel-chair bound boy with severe cerebral palsy along the way.
Aside from that, it's generally really well-written--Ulnich has fun with language and there a lot of really great/amusing sentences.
The plot is a bit over-reaching--a bit slow in the beginning and a bit over-the-top in the middle and the end. The traditional romantic storybook ending is tempered some by our heroine's choice of lover.
The plot is your basic chubby biracial Jewish girl goes to Moscow to make it big, and ends up a mail order bride/domestic slave in search of a father in the US and finds love with a wheel-chair bound boy with severe cerebral palsy along the way.
November 4, 2017
As with Life After Life, this was a book I needed to read. 10x’s better than Goldfinch, 12x’s better than most books that have much more hype.
The characters are surreal! Some of them are so human it’s hard to think they aren’t real people. And the character of the Russian village — Asbestos 2, the main character, the Petropolis, the crumbling symbol of Soviet Russia — is so powerful it becomes a part of each character in the book, even the “Americans.”
Some of this book was poetic and reminded me of Nobody Speaks of Remarkable things. Some of this book was blunt and visual enough to make me laugh at the absurdity or cringe at the realism of the time.
In other words, holy wow! I feel humbled and inspired.
The characters are surreal! Some of them are so human it’s hard to think they aren’t real people. And the character of the Russian village — Asbestos 2, the main character, the Petropolis, the crumbling symbol of Soviet Russia — is so powerful it becomes a part of each character in the book, even the “Americans.”
Some of this book was poetic and reminded me of Nobody Speaks of Remarkable things. Some of this book was blunt and visual enough to make me laugh at the absurdity or cringe at the realism of the time.
In other words, holy wow! I feel humbled and inspired.
November 24, 2012
Reading this was like visiting granny. She's a nice sweet old thing and all, but I could be out doing something. Sorry granny. Have another peppermint.
Oh, by the way, you have to forgive me tonight, I'm at work and I'm totally not working. I bet you noticed already!! I'm trying the break the most-would-be-amusing-reviews-in-one-evening record.
Oh, by the way, you have to forgive me tonight, I'm at work and I'm totally not working. I bet you noticed already!! I'm trying the break the most-would-be-amusing-reviews-in-one-evening record.
December 12, 2018
Okay, people, I tried...
I usually don't leave reviews on books I didn't finish, but seeing as I made it nearly halfway through this book before giving up, I figured I could say a few words. I figure the review of someone who DNFed a book can be just as worthwhile as the review of someone who plowed all the way through it, so long as they only judge the part of the book they read. Because sometimes someone's reasoning of why they couldn't finish can be valid too.
I dunno... I feel like I got a different book than the one promised in the summary. I guess I was expecting a road-trip novel from the perspective of an outsider to American culture, which could have been brilliant. And while I knew this book would have some grim stuff in it (Russia isn't exactly a pleasant place to live, especially in poverty), the book's reviews promised some humor (albeit dark humor) to offset it. But by the halfway point of the book I had gotten very little humor and nothing in the way of a road-trip journey -- yes, the main character travels from Siberia to Arizona to Chicago, but each time the journey is glossed over in a couple of paragraphs.
I might have been able to proceed regardless had the main character been at all interesting... but I couldn't bring myself to like Sasha Goldberg. Her story had some interesting elements to it, and her dysfunctional family had some interesting dynamics (though Anya Ulinich falls into the trap of having to dump the entire backstory of every single character on us at some point), but Sasha herself seemed curiously detached from the world around her, to the point where it became difficult to care about her. I understand that detaching yourself can be a survival mechanism, but it makes it very hard to empathize with a character as well.
Despite so many rave reviews, and despite my fascination with Russian culture and the country as a whole, I was disappointed enough in "Petropolis" that I abandoned it halfway through. I failed to find much in the way of humor, even black humor, in its pages, and I just couldn't bring myself to care about its story (what little there was) or its characters.
I usually don't leave reviews on books I didn't finish, but seeing as I made it nearly halfway through this book before giving up, I figured I could say a few words. I figure the review of someone who DNFed a book can be just as worthwhile as the review of someone who plowed all the way through it, so long as they only judge the part of the book they read. Because sometimes someone's reasoning of why they couldn't finish can be valid too.
I dunno... I feel like I got a different book than the one promised in the summary. I guess I was expecting a road-trip novel from the perspective of an outsider to American culture, which could have been brilliant. And while I knew this book would have some grim stuff in it (Russia isn't exactly a pleasant place to live, especially in poverty), the book's reviews promised some humor (albeit dark humor) to offset it. But by the halfway point of the book I had gotten very little humor and nothing in the way of a road-trip journey -- yes, the main character travels from Siberia to Arizona to Chicago, but each time the journey is glossed over in a couple of paragraphs.
I might have been able to proceed regardless had the main character been at all interesting... but I couldn't bring myself to like Sasha Goldberg. Her story had some interesting elements to it, and her dysfunctional family had some interesting dynamics (though Anya Ulinich falls into the trap of having to dump the entire backstory of every single character on us at some point), but Sasha herself seemed curiously detached from the world around her, to the point where it became difficult to care about her. I understand that detaching yourself can be a survival mechanism, but it makes it very hard to empathize with a character as well.
Despite so many rave reviews, and despite my fascination with Russian culture and the country as a whole, I was disappointed enough in "Petropolis" that I abandoned it halfway through. I failed to find much in the way of humor, even black humor, in its pages, and I just couldn't bring myself to care about its story (what little there was) or its characters.
May 14, 2008
A few days ago, a friend instant messaged me from Ukraine. I was terrified. I often email in the language—when I can take the time to check my grammar and spelling—but have never before engaged in a real-time written conversation.
Not only was I trying to remember vocabulary and declensions, but I was also dealing with typing in an entirely different alphabet. My deficiencies were mortifying, and I was sure my friend thought I was a complete moron.
At the same time, I was reading Anya Ulinich’s debut novel Petropolis. Anya Ulinich is a native Russian who migrated to the United States, without speaking any English, when she was 17. The book is delightful, and I was impressed with Ulinich’s control of English—and even more depressed with my own Ukrainian skills.
Granted, Ulinich has now lived in the United States longer than she lived in Russia. Yet, she still deserves credit for absorbing a language to the extent that she can not only write a novel but a good novel, a humorous novel, in that language—something most native speakers could never do.
The novel’s protagonist is Sasha, a Russian girl with African ancestry and a Jewish last name. She struggles to fit into the Soviet mold, particularly in her small Siberian mining town of Asbestos 2 (perhaps the greatest place name ever). Sasha eventually immigrates to Arizona as a mail-order bride and ultimately finds herself in Chicago and New York.
I lived in Arizona for a year and experienced terrible culture shock as an American. Not surprisingly, Sasha experiences similar feelings. Her escapades in both Russia and the United States range from the tragic to the hilarious.
Ulinich is a skilled writer who balances brutal honesty (about both Russians and Americans) with humor. The novel ends a bit too satisfactorily—particularly since it's written by someone raised in the Russian literary tradition—but I thoroughly enjoyed the ride.
Not only was I trying to remember vocabulary and declensions, but I was also dealing with typing in an entirely different alphabet. My deficiencies were mortifying, and I was sure my friend thought I was a complete moron.
At the same time, I was reading Anya Ulinich’s debut novel Petropolis. Anya Ulinich is a native Russian who migrated to the United States, without speaking any English, when she was 17. The book is delightful, and I was impressed with Ulinich’s control of English—and even more depressed with my own Ukrainian skills.
Granted, Ulinich has now lived in the United States longer than she lived in Russia. Yet, she still deserves credit for absorbing a language to the extent that she can not only write a novel but a good novel, a humorous novel, in that language—something most native speakers could never do.
The novel’s protagonist is Sasha, a Russian girl with African ancestry and a Jewish last name. She struggles to fit into the Soviet mold, particularly in her small Siberian mining town of Asbestos 2 (perhaps the greatest place name ever). Sasha eventually immigrates to Arizona as a mail-order bride and ultimately finds herself in Chicago and New York.
I lived in Arizona for a year and experienced terrible culture shock as an American. Not surprisingly, Sasha experiences similar feelings. Her escapades in both Russia and the United States range from the tragic to the hilarious.
Ulinich is a skilled writer who balances brutal honesty (about both Russians and Americans) with humor. The novel ends a bit too satisfactorily—particularly since it's written by someone raised in the Russian literary tradition—but I thoroughly enjoyed the ride.
July 12, 2008
Dark and funny. This book is about life; not all terrible, but not all rosy. The main character, Sasha Goldberg, was a black, Jewish Russian. She grew up in a small town Siberia called Abestos 2. Her decisions in life took her to different situations that I could completely relate to. Growing up with a mom who worked all the time to put food on the table and did her best to give you the best opportunities; seeking a father who you long to be close to but yet leave you with disappointments after you get to know him; being self-destructive even though you knew better; etc. I could sense that Sasha felt lost and lonely in her world. She lived in the moment because it seemed to be the "safest" thing for her to do. If she would look back, it might bring her tears; and looking forward might bring despair. The end, when Sasha reminisced about her home in Abestos 2, saddened me. Being an emigrant myself, I don't think you could ever forget "home." It's a place where you feel you belong even if it's a rotten place.
The story is real and complex. I really enjoyed the book, and I caught myself laughing out loud many, many times.
The story is real and complex. I really enjoyed the book, and I caught myself laughing out loud many, many times.
June 12, 2010
Perhaps I really liked this book because it told me what has happened when you have lost everything. Sash Goldberg is an outcast - living in post-Lenin Russia, in poverty with her mother, growing up with a father who walked out on her, and to add to it - she is both black and Jewish, and overweight. This calls for some serious discrimination (such as she can't be a "snowflake" with her classmates in the school play). The book follows Sasha through her life - her first love, her schooling struggles, and her immigration to America (as a mail-order Russian bride.)
The book consistently leaves you on the edge. Anya Ulinich has a comfortable writing style that pulls the reader in. You are watching the story unfold, and reading the book never felt like a chore. Although the story has extremes (immigrating, cheating through school, etc.) it's still easy for a teenager, or anyone really, to relate to.
I recommend this book for those who are fond of memoirs. Although this isn't one, it reads like one. But also for anyone who really just likes a good, dramatic story.
The book consistently leaves you on the edge. Anya Ulinich has a comfortable writing style that pulls the reader in. You are watching the story unfold, and reading the book never felt like a chore. Although the story has extremes (immigrating, cheating through school, etc.) it's still easy for a teenager, or anyone really, to relate to.
I recommend this book for those who are fond of memoirs. Although this isn't one, it reads like one. But also for anyone who really just likes a good, dramatic story.
Want to read
December 19, 2007"Anya Ulinich's Petropolis is a coming-of-age story, a novel about outsiderness, about being a Jew and an immigrant, a Lost Girl trying to find the father who left when she was a child. That Ulinich steers clear of sentimentality may seem like a minor miracle. It's the real trick of Petropolis, and she pulls it off by sending her heroine—an awkward, intelligent teenager from Siberia who becomes a mail-order bride—on a comic odyssey through a United States populated almost entirely by desperate characters. Among Ulinich's talents are inventiveness and a light touch with dark material. But it's her remarkable observations of both Russian and American culture that make this one of the debuts of the year. EMILY WEINSTEIN" -- Village Voice
February 22, 2009
Another solid read from the Jewish Russian American set (I really enjoyed Gary Stengyhart's (sp?) "Absurdistan.") Ulinich, in her first novel, can't quite match his prose or absurdity, but, nonetheless, writes a quality debut (and probably should be seen for herself, not only in the light of Stengyhart). The plot is compelling: you want to know what will happen to Sasha. Also, Ulinich's emotional conflict is believable and moving. The details and descriptions are great: she is a talented writer. This book, with its depiction of Siberian life, made me hate Capitalism and America a little less. Ulinich's satarizing (is that a word?) of Americans (particularly the rich) is wholly enjoyable. Definitely an entertaining, lyrical, funny and moving look into the life of an immigrant.
May 16, 2012
What attracted me to this novel was its similarity to Super Sad True Love Story
by Gary Shteyngart, a dystopian novel that also happens to be quite hilarious. But it is important for any potential read to know upfront that they're not about to experience something quite as wacky as Super Sad True Love Story.
That said, Ulinich's novel makes for a highly compelling read. It is quirky and the momentum is continuous. The plot takes you from location to location (and bizarre situation after bizarre situation). But it's not a funny novel (although it is entertaining and highly imaginative). Still, while it wasn't quite what I was expecting, I stayed up far too late reading the book on a number of occasions (my test of how much I enjoyed a particular book).
by Gary Shteyngart, a dystopian novel that also happens to be quite hilarious. But it is important for any potential read to know upfront that they're not about to experience something quite as wacky as Super Sad True Love Story.
That said, Ulinich's novel makes for a highly compelling read. It is quirky and the momentum is continuous. The plot takes you from location to location (and bizarre situation after bizarre situation). But it's not a funny novel (although it is entertaining and highly imaginative). Still, while it wasn't quite what I was expecting, I stayed up far too late reading the book on a number of occasions (my test of how much I enjoyed a particular book).
July 25, 2015
This book was phenomenal. Post-Soviet Russia, immigrating to America as a child-bride, looking for her father who abandoned her and her mother in Asbestos 2, a town in Siberia, and leaving her child, Nadia, who she had at 15 but her mother raises, is the world that we enter and the world that our main character, Sasha, lives. Beautifully written, with a nice sardonic air, as a good Russian person would, Anya Ulinich rocks this story. If you want to know even a little bit about what a Russian immigrant's mentality is all about, this is it. I feel so much more for my family's journey here and how uncomfortable it must have been initially for my parents. Highly recommend! Now excuse me, as I need to grab a tissue to wipe the tears away. Loved it.
January 18, 2009
The more I read, the more I felt I had to read. This is good stuff. Funny, honest, heartbreaking, fo real.
Its a coming of age story about a biracial jewish(ish) girl who emmigrates to America as a mail order bride. She has lots of fascinating experiences.
The writing is wonderful, beautiful.
The title is taken from a Russian poem by Osip Mandelstam:
“At a terrifying height a wandering fire,
But is this how a star sparkles, flying?
Transparent star, a wandering fire,
Your brother, Petropolis, is dying.”
Its a coming of age story about a biracial jewish(ish) girl who emmigrates to America as a mail order bride. She has lots of fascinating experiences.
The writing is wonderful, beautiful.
The title is taken from a Russian poem by Osip Mandelstam:
“At a terrifying height a wandering fire,
But is this how a star sparkles, flying?
Transparent star, a wandering fire,
Your brother, Petropolis, is dying.”
March 28, 2009
This book was an easy read about a young girl finding her way through life. Growing up in an impoverished area in Siberia, she encounters many obstacles but continues to move on trying to make a better life for herself. She actually had many things going for her, but the usual rebellious teenage behavior steps in and takes over. I don't usually read books centered in Russia, so I found the geographical aspects interesting as well. I don't want to give anything away, but I was happy with the way the ending played out.
February 23, 2016
I think I lied this book more than I realized after immediately finishing it. Although I wasn't crazy about where the story was heading I always found it enjoyable to read. I think its partly because of the great characters that are so different and well depicted. I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it!
October 14, 2009
Hysterical. Absurd. Touching.
September 16, 2010
Heavy and depressing. But quality writing.
October 23, 2014
Soooo good.
August 9, 2018
I really enjoyed this book and the leading character, one Sasha Goldberg, who begins life in the inauspicious village of Abestos 2 in Siberia. Her father Victor, child of a fleeting African-Russian union, is adopted by a Jewish couple, thus becoming a "Goldberg", honorary Jew.
Her mother Lubov, a local librarian is anxious about her 10-year-old daughter, especially after her husband leaves her to move to America. Lubov enrolls Sasha at 14 in a local after-school art program where she connects to a friend, Katia. The basement studio is ramshackled with an odd assortment of misfits- both teachers and students, but it helps Sasha escape from her otherwise painful life at home and school. She hooks up with Katia's dropout brother, Alexy, and at 16 delivers his baby girl, Nadia (Hope).
Sasha begins to think about her future and her mother urges her to go to Art School in Moscow while she will raise the baby back home. Once in Moscow, Sasha quickly loses interest in an art career and ends up with a matrimonial agency for Russian Brides (though she is only 16, claiming she is 18). A middle-aged American from Phoenix, Neal, brings her home on a fiance visa, but she both is bored and lonely. In ESL class she teams up with Marina, another exile from Russia, awaiting visa renewal with her Jewish family. After a year with Neal, Sasha reclaims her Russian passport and walks away, taking the Greyhound to Chicago to Marina's relatives.
In Chicago, she winds up in a bizarre situation, a "captive" of a wealthy Jewish matron, her personal pet project and assistant housecleaner. Luckily, the handicapped son, Jake, of Mrs. Tarakan ("cockroach" in Russian) helps Sasha locate her father in New York and buys her an airline ticket so she can escape once more.
I won't describe the final chapters as Sasha finds her father (who has re-married and has a young son), she starts a business, visits her mother and daughter in Siberia, and finds her true love. Through it all, Sasha keeps maturing and dealing with both American and Soviet reality and Ulinich keeps us laughing and reading.
Anya Ulinich has a great gift for drawing characters which are flawed, but oh-so-human, and most of them likable. At the same time, her descriptions capture a sense of place so well.
In Siberia: "The bus made a circle and drove away, enveloping Sasha and her pineapple earrings in a cloud of diesel exhaust. Because it was Sunday, the tobacco kiosk at the end of the road was shuttered. Sasha thought she could hear insects buzz, but then she saw power lines above the trees and remembered that it was too early in the year for bugs. The forest in front of her was still leafless but already faintly green, like a tinted black-and white photo"
In Phoenix: "The white carcass of an old ice cream truck seems to have sprouted in a garbage-strewn field of Bermuda grass. Sasha and Marina use it for shade. Through the truck's shattered windows, Sasha can see the flat rooftops and the adobe walls of Marina's apartment complex, the Palisades.
The Palisades used to be a motel. A large wooden sign, PALISADES MOTEL VACANCY, still stands near its driveway, with MOTEL VACANCY painted over. The rest of the Palisades landscaping consists of a kidney-shaped swimming pool filled with dirt, an artistically placed boulder, two palm trees, and a broken soda machine, and at dusk meaty brown water bugs exit its bottom in pairs and promenade by the pool."
As someone who lived in Moscow for 23 years, I can easily understand and believe the Russian/Soviet characters and, especially, how they behave and survive once they land in America. As an American, I can also believe and understand the Americans that populate this novel. In some ways, it's a clash of cultures; in other ways, it's an awkward fusing of lifestyles and expectations.
Though "Petropolis" has much entertainment value, I believe it more deeply explores themes of friendship and parent-child relationships. This, on top of, Sasha's adaptation and seizing opportunities leads to a most satisfying conclusion. Highly recommended.
Her mother Lubov, a local librarian is anxious about her 10-year-old daughter, especially after her husband leaves her to move to America. Lubov enrolls Sasha at 14 in a local after-school art program where she connects to a friend, Katia. The basement studio is ramshackled with an odd assortment of misfits- both teachers and students, but it helps Sasha escape from her otherwise painful life at home and school. She hooks up with Katia's dropout brother, Alexy, and at 16 delivers his baby girl, Nadia (Hope).
Sasha begins to think about her future and her mother urges her to go to Art School in Moscow while she will raise the baby back home. Once in Moscow, Sasha quickly loses interest in an art career and ends up with a matrimonial agency for Russian Brides (though she is only 16, claiming she is 18). A middle-aged American from Phoenix, Neal, brings her home on a fiance visa, but she both is bored and lonely. In ESL class she teams up with Marina, another exile from Russia, awaiting visa renewal with her Jewish family. After a year with Neal, Sasha reclaims her Russian passport and walks away, taking the Greyhound to Chicago to Marina's relatives.
In Chicago, she winds up in a bizarre situation, a "captive" of a wealthy Jewish matron, her personal pet project and assistant housecleaner. Luckily, the handicapped son, Jake, of Mrs. Tarakan ("cockroach" in Russian) helps Sasha locate her father in New York and buys her an airline ticket so she can escape once more.
I won't describe the final chapters as Sasha finds her father (who has re-married and has a young son), she starts a business, visits her mother and daughter in Siberia, and finds her true love. Through it all, Sasha keeps maturing and dealing with both American and Soviet reality and Ulinich keeps us laughing and reading.
Anya Ulinich has a great gift for drawing characters which are flawed, but oh-so-human, and most of them likable. At the same time, her descriptions capture a sense of place so well.
In Siberia: "The bus made a circle and drove away, enveloping Sasha and her pineapple earrings in a cloud of diesel exhaust. Because it was Sunday, the tobacco kiosk at the end of the road was shuttered. Sasha thought she could hear insects buzz, but then she saw power lines above the trees and remembered that it was too early in the year for bugs. The forest in front of her was still leafless but already faintly green, like a tinted black-and white photo"
In Phoenix: "The white carcass of an old ice cream truck seems to have sprouted in a garbage-strewn field of Bermuda grass. Sasha and Marina use it for shade. Through the truck's shattered windows, Sasha can see the flat rooftops and the adobe walls of Marina's apartment complex, the Palisades.
The Palisades used to be a motel. A large wooden sign, PALISADES MOTEL VACANCY, still stands near its driveway, with MOTEL VACANCY painted over. The rest of the Palisades landscaping consists of a kidney-shaped swimming pool filled with dirt, an artistically placed boulder, two palm trees, and a broken soda machine, and at dusk meaty brown water bugs exit its bottom in pairs and promenade by the pool."
As someone who lived in Moscow for 23 years, I can easily understand and believe the Russian/Soviet characters and, especially, how they behave and survive once they land in America. As an American, I can also believe and understand the Americans that populate this novel. In some ways, it's a clash of cultures; in other ways, it's an awkward fusing of lifestyles and expectations.
Though "Petropolis" has much entertainment value, I believe it more deeply explores themes of friendship and parent-child relationships. This, on top of, Sasha's adaptation and seizing opportunities leads to a most satisfying conclusion. Highly recommended.
April 3, 2024
Ulinich’s “Petropolis” is filled with such vivid and well-developed characters. It weaves a variegated tapestry of emotional colors- moving effortlessly from hilarity to heartbreak. Surprisingly moving.
February 27, 2019
Harrowing and funny. The parts that stretch believability are the parts that are the most real. Thank your lucky stars you weren't born in the Soviet Union.
February 28, 2018
***SPOILERS****
Given my love of Gary Shteyngart's novels, and my general Russophilia, I picked this up. It's a grittier story — not devoid of humor, but missing the laugh-out-loud farce of an Absurdistan. It's also a simple story about growing up under complicated circumstances.
The main character is likeable; you root for her and her misfit friends, but it was her mother who I most felt for — the woman who is left behind, who does the hard and sometimes awful things that she thinks will make her daughter's and granddaughter's lives better, right down to killing herself. And the thing is, she's right — the things she does are the best things she can do at the time. She bears the injustice and hardship and makes do, which reminds me very much of my own (Russian) mother.
The book's male characters are, for the most part, pretty awful — not cruel or bad, but without agency, irresponsible and infantile. I'm sure it's no mistake that the strongest male character in the book has cerebral palsy, as if the fragility of the body is the only thing that enables the purpose and activity of the mind.
Given my love of Gary Shteyngart's novels, and my general Russophilia, I picked this up. It's a grittier story — not devoid of humor, but missing the laugh-out-loud farce of an Absurdistan. It's also a simple story about growing up under complicated circumstances.
The main character is likeable; you root for her and her misfit friends, but it was her mother who I most felt for — the woman who is left behind, who does the hard and sometimes awful things that she thinks will make her daughter's and granddaughter's lives better, right down to killing herself. And the thing is, she's right — the things she does are the best things she can do at the time. She bears the injustice and hardship and makes do, which reminds me very much of my own (Russian) mother.
The book's male characters are, for the most part, pretty awful — not cruel or bad, but without agency, irresponsible and infantile. I'm sure it's no mistake that the strongest male character in the book has cerebral palsy, as if the fragility of the body is the only thing that enables the purpose and activity of the mind.
February 22, 2018
Ein Hoch auf den Bücherschrank in der VHS, der mir dieses Schätzchen zugespielt hat. Das Buch hat mir sehr gut gefallen und besonders berührt hat mich der Versuch von Alexei, sich um Verhütung zu kümmern. Jake fand ich auch sehr sympathisch und es freut mich, dass die Geschichte letztlich ein Ende gefunden hat, das zumindest irgendwie okay war und womit Sascha vermutlich zwischendurch niemals hätte rechnen können. Das namensgebende Gedicht von Ossip Mandelstam (ihn kannte ich vorher nicht) empfehle ich sehr. Gänsehaut. Für Neugierige:
https://books.google.de/books?id=iFya...
https://books.google.de/books?id=iFya...
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 18, 2010
"Petropolis" -Anya Ulinich (2007)
I picked up this book on a whim, interested because of the "hip" looking cover art. After reading the summary, I lost a bit of interest. But once I began reading? I was hooked. I liked especially how the story was broken down into separate parts to tell each leg of the main character's journey. While I couldn't necessarily relate to any of the characters, I think what I enjoyed so much was that I learned a lot and saw the world (if only momentarily) through the eyes of someone completely unlike myself, with a different background and culture and experiences...and that's what made it such an entrancing read.
Began: July 2009
Ended: July 2009
Page Count: 324
I picked up this book on a whim, interested because of the "hip" looking cover art. After reading the summary, I lost a bit of interest. But once I began reading? I was hooked. I liked especially how the story was broken down into separate parts to tell each leg of the main character's journey. While I couldn't necessarily relate to any of the characters, I think what I enjoyed so much was that I learned a lot and saw the world (if only momentarily) through the eyes of someone completely unlike myself, with a different background and culture and experiences...and that's what made it such an entrancing read.
Began: July 2009
Ended: July 2009
Page Count: 324
Displaying 1 - 30 of 196 reviews