The Memory Keeper of Kyiv: The most powerful, important historical novel of 2022

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First of all these are very savvy and punctured people. Living through lifetimes of being full boat annihilated and all their goods, homes, cultural mores, religion being taken away from them by government. And usually not even able to speak their own languages in schools or any public forum. Starvation merely one of the sidebars. In 1929, Katya is 16 years old, surrounded by family and in love with the boy next door. When Stalin’s activists arrive in her village, it’s just a few, a little pressure to join the collective. But soon neighbours disappear, those who speak out are never seen again and every new day is uncertain.The characters in the 1930 timeline are well-carved and gutsy. Each of them creates an impact for various reasons. Of the 2004 characters, Birdie was the sweetest. While not as taut nor as refined as an established writer, Litteken, nevertheless, capably exposes Stalin’s plan to convince Ukrainians that they can have a better life and much more prosperous farms if they pool their resources and work together, class-free. Her dual timeline is set in the fictional village of Sonayshnyky, Ukraine in 1929 and in Wisconsin, USA in 2004. I have never read any book covering the topic of the ‘Holodomor’, the manmade famine that resulted in the loss of almost 4 million Ukrainian lives during the 1930s. That itself should be the biggest reason to go for this book. It reveals unheard-of details of a travesty that has never been highlighted. There were so many elements that felt like exaggerations because I simply couldn’t believe humans could do something as low. But the author’s note and her sources show that every despicable event is true. Kudos to her research.

Seventy years later, a young widow discovers her grandmother’s journal, one that will reveal the long-buried secrets of her family’s haunted past. Heartbreaking tale of the Homodor or Murder by Hunger, a man made famine that killed millions of people in Ukraine during Stalin's forced collective farms program. This was a horrible time in history and it has been covered up and forgotten. It should never be forgotten. When productive farms were taken over by the government and people killed or shipped to Siberia for simply disagreeing with the government or for trying to find food to survive. When people are reduced to eating earthworms and grain from the burrows of rats to survive and they are still dying. When a woman drops dead in a food line to receive a slice of bread. When people work all day on farms that are not their own and not allowed to work their own farms being paid only with a slice of bread for the day's work, the system is wrong, cruel and broken. So this book being entwined with a romance? And also the form itself. The dialogue was YA. Telling and telling too. Not showing. And few populations could be farther removed from both of those habits. Not in real life. Or any reality I've seen them live. Nor any I have loved or have seen departed early from the aftermaths. Seventy years later that Ukrainian bride is now the grandmother of the young grieving American widow. For many years the grandmother has repressed the traumatic memories of her past and has withheld any mention of it to her family. But now this aging grandmother is developing symptoms of dementia, and those memories from long ago are beginning to arise. Furthermore, she perceives that her granddaughter and great granddaughter could benefit by learning about her experience recovering from trauma all those many years ago.The story alternated chapter wise between 1930s Ukraine and present day in 2004 and was well written as a dual timeline, and really brought readers into the historical setting of the time and made me understand and feel what they were going through very well. In my opinion this is a must read, especially since I have already talked with so many other people who have never heard of this. Learning about the Holodomor also gives another layer of perspective on the current tragedy taking place in Ukraine today. My heart breaks more for all the Ukrainians have suffered. It’s the same story every time, for centuries. Everyone wants Ukraine’s fertile soil for their own, and nobody wants to let Ukrainians rule it. “ With the help of a kind neighbor who is fluent in Ukrainian, Cassie is able to translate her grandmother’s journal. Through this journal, Cassie learns of the unspeakable hardships her grandmother suffered during the Holodomor (great famine) inflicted on the Ukrainian people at the direction of Stalin in the 1930’s. Zusammen ergibt es ein großes Ganzes, das viele bewegende Momente mit sich bringt. Wobei ich ganz klar sagen muss, dass mich der Erzählstrang der Vergangenheit am meisten bewegt und berührt hat. Durch die häufig wechselnde Zeit und Perspektive fiel es mir gerade im Bezug auf Cassie doch schwer einen Bezug aufzubauen und sie blieb mir ehrlich gesagt doch sehr fern.