Glorious People (Paperback) - Sasha Salzmann

'A fascinating account of the collapse of the Soviet Union' MARIE CLAIRE

'Masterful and haunting' ELENA GOROKHOVA

For Lena, childhood summers meant training to be a good socialist at Pioneer camp, singing songs in praise of Lenin. But when perestroika shatters her world, all must be unlearned. Lena's corner of the USSR is suddenly Ukraine: there is a McDonalds in Moscow's Red Square and certified foreign whisky, but no food in the shops.

For her friend Tatyana, survival in her changing homeland requires new skills: bullet dodging, business sense and a knack for bribery and corruption. When both women head West in search of new beginnings, their homesickness for a vanished land is inherited by their rebellious daughters, caught between forging their own identities and untangling the rich histories of the mothers who raised them.

About the Author

SASHA SALZMANN was born in Volgograd in 1985 and grew up in Moscow. In 1995, they emigrated to Germany with their family. Salzmann is an award-winning playwright, essayist, curator, and co-founder of the culture magazine Freitext and their work has been translated and performed in over 20 countries. Glorious People was longlisted for the German Book Prize 2021. In 2022, Salzmann received the prestigious Hermann-Hesse-Literaturpreis and the Preis der Literaturhauser.