The Russian Dreambook of Colour and Flight

Item: The Russian Dreambook of Colour and Flight
Author: WhichBook

Gina Ochsner

An unusual tale of a group of Russians who all live in a dilapidated block of flats, some of whom also work together in a mock museum in Pern. A nice mix of characters, sad from the sheer drabness of their everyday struggle but with some humour about the absurdities of a pseudo museum and a newspaper which never reports the true story.

Extract

At this precise moment, for some reason - God only knew why - maybe because her eyes and ears had become well turned for a disaster in progress - Olga looked up. A dark form fell past the kitchen window and landed on the heap with a loud thud.

'Good God!' Yuri jumped from his chair. Olga threw open the window. For a long moment Olga, Yuri and Zoya observed Mircha's broken body, steaming in the snow beside the heap. ...

'Go and bring him in,' Olga turned to Yuri at last. 'We'll put him in the bath,' she said, pulling the window closed and drawing the curtain over it.

Having read 'The Death of Ivan Ilyich' several times, and being university educated, Olga took Tolstoy quite at his word when he advised keeping death in the living room in order to appreciate life.

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