Description
Book SynopsisLike a Drop of Ink in a Downpour: in Soviet Russia is a memoir that traces the lives of a girl, Alёna, her mother and her grandmother, and their quest to preserve the legacy of Alёna's late grandfather, a prominent artist who depicted the Holocaust. For years his canvases are locked away in their apartment with no hope of being exhibited because of art policies of the state. When the family decides to emigrate the unexpected happens: Alёna's father refuses to let her go, her grandmother leaves alone with the paintings, and her mother is accused of a fabricated crime and incarcerated. She serves her sentence at the notorious Kresti prison, Sablino labor camp, and as an exile with compulsory labor in Gorky. The wonder of childhood and motherhood persists amid their battles, and three generations of women call on their resilience to find their way back to one another. Narrated in the voices of the girl and her mother, their shifting perspectives creates a vivid view of women and girls in Leningrad of the '70s and '80s.
Table of ContentsNOTE ON NAMES
PART ONE: ALЁNA
In the Woods
From the Beginning
Village in a Stack
Rain and Frost
The Shared and the Unspoken
A Time to Uproot
Pápochka
To Fairyland
Within and Without
PART TWO: GALIA
The Rain You Accidentally Saw
My Childhood
My Marriage
The Decision to Emigrate
At the Railway
The Supermarket
The Beauty Salon
Kosmétika’s District Branch
The Unplanned
Krestí Prison
The Zóna: Sáblino Labor Camp
The City of Bitter
PART THREE: ALЁNA
Adolescence
A Time to Wait
Drawing with Erasers
On the Ladders
“MEMORY” by Galia Lembersky
GLOSSARY
CREDITS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
