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Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets

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Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets by Svetlana Alexievich offers a profound exploration of post-Soviet Russia through a series of personal interviews. It captures the voices of ordinary citizens as they transition from the USSR's dissolution into the new Russian reality, revealing a tapestry of emotions, nostalgia, and the struggles of adapting to change. The book provides a rich, poignant insight into the lives and thoughts of people living through this pivotal historical moment.
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

You might enjoy this book if you're fascinated by first-hand accounts of history, specifically the transitional period of the post-Soviet Union. It offers a compelling oral history, weaving together personal stories that provide a unique perspective on the emotional and societal impacts of this era.

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Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

From the 2015 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, Svetlana Alexievich, comes the first English translation of her latest work, an oral history of the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of a new Russia.

Bringing together dozens of voices in her distinctive documentary style, Secondhand Time is a monument to the collapse of the USSR, charting the decline of Soviet culture and speculating on what will rise from the ashes of Communism.

As in all her books, Alexievich gives voice to women and men whose stories are lost in the official narratives of nation-states, creating a powerful alternative history from the personal and private stories of individuals.

Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

Svetlana Alexievich's Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets is widely praised as a powerful oral history that captures the emotional evolution of the Soviet and post-Soviet experience through intimate personal testimonies. Reviewers celebrate her ability to weave a rich tapestry of voices, creating a poignant narrative that explores universal human values, with a particular focus on the profound upheaval faced by ordinary people after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Her work is described as both profoundly moving and deeply empathic, offering an alternative to official historical narratives through the raw, personal reflections of those who lived through these transformative times.

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Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9781925355567

Publisher: Text Publishing

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 30 May 2016

Country: Australia

Imprint: The Text Publishing Company

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 36.0mm

Width: 158.0mm

Height: 234.0mm

Weight: 646g

Pages: 520

About the Author

Svetlana Alexievich was born in the Ukraine in 1948 and grew up in Belarus. As a newspaper journalist, she spent her early career in Minsk compiling first-hand accounts of World War II, the Soviet-Afghan War, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Chernobyl meltdown. Her unflinching work-'the whole of our historyais a huge common grave and a bloodbath'-earned her persecution from the Lukashenko regime and she was forced to emigrate. She lived in Paris, Gothenburg and Berlin before returning to Minsk in 2011. She has won a number of prizes, including the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Prix MUdicis, and the Oxfam Novib/PEN Award. In 2015, she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

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