This is an interesting look at the lives of 2 young girls coming of age in the 1980s in Russia. The author was inspired by speculating about her friends' lives. After noticing a parallel with Chekov's Cherry Orchard, I believe that she played up the similarities, but this honestly did not feel like a retelling. It stands pretty solidly all on its own. I really enjoyed this. It's dark, but not as dark as classical Russian literature. I definitely recommend this one.

Four teens in the 1980’s are all living in the last days of the USSR. However, none have the exact same experiences.

Told by Anya, whose parents have a dacha and an apple orchard and food to eat. Best friend Milka has nothing but an abusive step-father and whatever she can find to eat. Together with their friends, Trifonov and Lopatin, they make the best of the situations they are in. They may fight and bicker but they have each other’s back.

There is a heavy influence going on with Chekhov and his The Cherry Orchard. Anya’s parents talk of the collapse of the government and how bad things are going to be and have been since WWII. There seems to be a great divide in this country. Those who have it all and those who don’t. Even after the fall, there is so much more food and luxuries, however, only a few can afford them.

When an unspeakable event turns their lives upside down their friendships fade. Anya will move to the US and marry a good man and not return for 20 years. And when she does, not much has changed, just the players.

This was a very good story. Fiction, but not. Russia is such a secretive place and we know very little firsthand about life there. And they have their perceptions of other countries as well. This beautiful book made me laugh, it made me cry and I would read it all over again. These women were strong and made something out of nothing. I was very impressed.

NetGalley/March 15th, 2022 by Ballantine Books

THE ORCHARD
BY: KRISTINA GORCHEVA-NEWBERRY

From the very beginning there are beautiful prose with a sense of solitude to the Russian countryside where the narrator Anya describes with breathtaking language the apple orchard where her parents have a dacha. I wish I had highlighted the paragraphs about the many different varieties of apples the trees yield and the imagery of the many shades of red. Breathtaking! From the very beginning Anya describes her best friend Milka who is always by her side. The two listening to their only cassette of Freddy Mercury of the group Queen singing Bohemian Rhapsody and "We are the Champions of the World." The two of them singing along. Since first grade these two have been joined at the hip and they spend all of their time together at Anya's family Dacha during the Summer months in the orchard, swimming in the river and taking baths together. And they are also at the dacha sometimes weekends in the Winter months. I wouldn't quite classify this as a Coming of age story because in the background there are Anya's parents bickering about Russian history from the Bolshevik's murder of the Czar throughout Hitler's Nazi Germany and Stalin. How Anya and Milka read a newspaper clipping from a young girl from the United States, who innocently writes a letter to a Russian leader that gets published asking why does the Soviet Union want a nuclear war? Anya and Milka write a letter to Ronald Reagan asking questions. It never occurred to me before that their Country grew up fearing a nuclear war during the Cold war and that they viewed America from the identical lenses that we viewed the Soviet Union. The two grew up highly sexually curious and it isn't until 31% in does the two boys that they invite from school Lopatin and Trifonov over to Anya's. Never do they spend time at Milka's because she is embarrassed about her living quarter's. But really everything anybody owns isn't really theirs. It can be taken by the Soviet Union at anytime. Anya is reminded by her parents that any talking done in the home stays private and behind closed doors. Her Grandmother lives with them, but she is mostly quiet and except preserving food for Winter consumption she stays neutral and doesn't talk about politics like Anya's parents. The two boys and Anya and Milka become become a party of four. They experiment more sexually and become inseparable. This is classified or marketed as Historical Fiction and Literary Fiction which I suppose it's both. My favorite parts were the quiet prose describing the pure and frozen undisturbed snow flakes drifting off the trees and the food which describes making a delicious apple paste to the ripe apples being harvested. I have a better understanding of Russian culture when the Soviet Union was crumbling and disintegrating. From the Revolution to the possibility of being able to travel to all the places Anya and Milka have dreamed about.

Part Two: Anya moves to the United States and gets married and has a PhD and has to travel back to the U.S.S.R to sort out Lopatin's trying to buy the land that her parents Dacha sits in the Apple Orchard. He has become a business man. Everything is different in the Motherland. This is a jump twenty years later. I loved the writing and enjoyed the culture but I don't see this as anything that I could think of anybody that I know who would be grateful for me recommending it to them. I am not anywhere near a prude, but I think that the beauty of the writing gets a bit diminished by the sexual descriptions and some of the language being coarse which for me personally, weakened the parts that were poetic. This is supposed to be inspired by Anton Chekhov's, "The Cherry Orchard," but having read it I didn't see its parallel to his play, but that is just my humble opinion. Read other reviews before deciding on my interpretation as it could just be me. Solid Four stars!

Publication Date: March 15, 2022

Thank you to Net Galley, Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry and Random House Publishing Ballantine- Ballantine Books for generously providing me with my ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.
All opinions are my own.

#TheOrchard #KristinaGorchevaNewberry #RandomHousePublishingGroupBallantineBallantineBooks #NetGalley

2.5 stars. This is historical fiction and a sort of coming-of-age novel. It is set in Russia in the 1980s and focuses on two close friends, who are almost like sisters, and eventually the two boys they meet, and the four of them have a close bond. This book has gotten rave reviews, so I may be an outlier on this one, but it just did not work for me. I found it hard to get into, and I really could not relate to the characters because they just were not that likable to me. This novel did, though, give me a decent glimpse of life in Russia as the Soviet Union began to disintegrate, and for that I applaud the author.

I wasn't sure what to expect with this book but ended up enjoying it quite a bit and learning a lot. Admittedly, I've struggled with literary fiction this past year, finding it hard to get myself to focus on books that require more attention. But this one did a good job of grabbing me and holding my interest, which is a feat. However, it did drag on at parts, making it a book I wasn't always jumping to pick up. But overall it was a worthwhile read, one that gave me insight into a country and time I didn't know a whole lot about.

I truly adored this. The blurb mentions that Anya and Milka are "coming of age in the Soviet Union," but I wouldn't specifically classify this as a quote-unquote coming of age novel. It's much more a slice-of-life introspective centering Anya. But you can't have Anya without Milka; they're inseparable. The entire narrative, with the twists and tragedies and heartwarming moments, are all built around Anya reflecting on memory, nationalism (though this isn't quite the right word as she isn't a nationalist), how life is shaped by grief and trauma, love and family. All wrapped up with several references to Viktor Tsoi <3. Also absolutely read the author's note if you can. Seeing how much of this was influenced by events in the author's own life was fascinating. I think that's part of the reason why this worked so well as a reflection on who and how we remember and how that impacts the way we live in the world around us.

A beautifully written, thoughtful rumination on what can happen when life-changing events occur on both micro and macro levels during the most formative years of one's life.

In this riveting and heart-wrenching novel about two young women growing up in the Soviet Union, we find every element of the traditional Russian novel turned to new purposes and deftly created amid the turmoil of the 1970s and 1980s. There is a ferocity in Gorcheva-Newberry's language that drives the book even as it lingers on details and relaxed, timeless moments. For anyone who has read books about the USSR from thrillers or non-fiction, this novel will broaden their concept of this period, and how everyday life was lived.

At first, by description I was excited to read a historical fiction story that was set in Russia during the 1980’s. I really tried hard to like this book as I love reading about Russian history, but finally decided to abandon a book. Something I rarely do. The obsessive exploration of young teens fixation on sex and the vulgarity of the language just put me off. I’m not a prude but I feel that this inclusion of language did not move the story forward nor was it necessary. Perhaps others would say that it reflects the teens’ angst of growing up in an oppressive society.

This is a story of the coming of age of two girls, alike in so many ways and like sisters, and yet they were from two vastly different home lives. Hope is a concept repeatedly mentioned as the only thing tangible that they have. The later befriend two boys and the four become very close as they continue to explore they sexuality and coming of age. At a quarter of the way through, having no enjoyment from this book, I have stopped. Again, very rare for me. The story drags on, there was no beauty in the language, the characters are very flawed and as a reader I didn’t care about them (except for the grandmother). Perhaps I will attempt this again, but who knows? I apologize at the abbreviated review.

Thank you to #netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Two teens in Russia in the 80s. They are best friends, Anya and Milka. Anya is calm and level headed where Milka is reckless and in desperate need of love. This book is a rich coming of age story full of friendship, lies, love and deceit. There is a political backdrop to this story, which ends up with one of the girls leaving Russia as an exchange student and then marries an American. Enjoy

I am definitely in the minority with this review. I am about half way through the book and I am having trouble finishing it; although I am going to keep at it to see if the second half gets more interesting. The pace of the book is a bit slow for my liking yet I appreciate the history and culture depicted. It might be I was just in the mood for something else at this moment; so onward and I will return to finish the book in a couple of weeks. If finishing changes my impression I will update this review!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an early release in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I want to thank NetGalley for the ARC. The Orchard is about 4 youth growing up in the 1980’s in the last days of the Soviet Union. The first half is a coming of age story from the viewpoint of Anya. The second part is about Anya living in the USA. She got married but her parents are still in Russia. Her friend’s former boyfriend is involved with a group trying to buy her parents’ dacha and apple orchard. Her parents are reluctant to sell it but they are under a lot of pressure. Anya goes back to Russia to see her parents and deal with the issue and her past. I enjoyed the book a lot. The author does a great job of describing life in the Soviet Union during the 1980’s and the changes that were taking place in the country.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this amazing book. The Orchard is a heartbreaking glimpse into Soviet life in the 80s. The story of Anya and Milka is both beautiful and painful. They are as close as sisters. Their lives are hopeful yet cruel. This is a beautifully told story of how our family, both the ones that take us in and the one that we are born in to, can shape us forever.

A magnificent story about the desperate times of Generation Perestroika.

Two teenagers in 1980s Russia share a cigarette. The reckless one, Milka, has just jumped from a high flying swing but sustains only a minor cut, saying from her seated position in the snow, “Wouldn’t that be cool to die on the same day as our Communist Leader?” The cautious one, Anya, tells her she’s nuts, that “Death is nothingness.” These two attitudes accompany the friends throughout the story. Milka is a dreamer of far away and exotic places. Anya is too practical for that, and her friend’s dreams only invoke her insecurities. Anya’s family has a modest dacha in the countryside, on which is an apple orchard. Milka’s mother has nothing but an incorrigible second husband, but Milka accompanies Anya to the dacha as if she is Anya’s sister. The apple orchard is a bit of a nod to Chekov’s cherry orchard, but it’s a loose connection. Gorcheva-Newberry’s apple orchard doesn’t so much represent materialism as Chekhov’s did. It is instead a symbol of the fragility of life during Russia’s transformation between Stalin and Gorbachev.

Like many Russian novels, The Orchard is rich with imagery. After an argument between Milka and her mother, Anya observes Milka’s face: “Winter lived there, with its ferocious winds and dead ossified earth and hard frozen snow.” Gorcheva-Newberry brilliantly weaves these images into the personalities of the novel’s characters. As seasons change, so do the characters, who often interact with each other with as much drama as a storm accompanying a passing cold front. In the end, a reader cannot know one character without the other three. Anya may be the narrator of the story, but the story is nothing without the others. It is reminiscent of Dostoevsky.
Can The Orchard be categorized as a coming-of-age novel? There are many elements that suggest it can be. At one point Milka states that she doesn’t want to grow up, “Because then you can’t blame anyone else for the shit that’s happening. It’s your own responsibility.” The cynicism appearing in many of Milka’s observations is also expressed by the girls’ two boyfriends, Lopatin and Trifonov. The author cleverly uses the personalities of the four characters to make pictures of angst and happiness, defeatism and hopefulness, and, finally, at the end of the novel, long after two of them have come of age, a mournful loss of resilience. Of course, there is a political backdrop to the story, much as there was in 1960s America for stories about those years. In Russia the times were much more sinister, where “We knew we had a fate, a destiny, designated by the Communist Party, and it was as irrevocable as the stars or the moon, as life itself.” There was some optimism, nevertheless, for a new Generation Perestroika when Anya and her friends were seventeen. But the optimism is fleeting for three of them.

Part Two of the novel begins in 1988, not in Russia but in America, where Anya marries while she is a foreign exchange student. Decades pass without her returning to Russia, and the reader sees her cautious personality bloom in her marriage. She says about her husband, “We rarely argued or disagreed or had long passionate conversations, and sometimes I thought of us as two pet fish in our aquarium, navigating through tall wavering weeds or hibernating inside a plastic castle, or hiding under a rock, ostracized by the glass.” But like so many Russian novels, trouble creeps into Anya’s life when she learns that a developer in Russia is badgering her parents to sell the dacha and its apple orchard. She must make a trip home. The weather imagery returns in a fashion similar to that used in Russia during Part One of the book. While driving her to the airport, her husband’s “face was a fall day—eyes clouded with thoughts, lips curled, folded at the corners like dry leaves.” Clearly, Anya’s life in America hasn’t been as harsh as it was in her coming of age years. Does the toned down imagery mean that the reader can expect a more optimistic end to Anya’s story than the endings in Dostoevsky, Bulgakov, or Chekhov? That’s for the reader to decide. For Anya’s family and friends, who’d not gone to America, the bleakness remains. Anya looks at her mother and notes that the “joy had been washed from her eyes; they were no longer blue but a dark, morose gray.”

Anya looks for closure during her visit to Russia, going to Milka’s house to confront her stepfather and visiting old places. The imagery returns to that of her teenage years, “a sunless frostbitten dawn, the air so white, as though sewn from snowflakes.” Worse, there was no snow, “the landscape grim, barren. It seemed as though nature wasn’t hibernating but dying.” And, of course, Lopatin shows up as the developer who wants the dacha and the orchard. He describes himself as an “old Russian with new money,” as well as bad news, of course. Anya and Lopatin go to the dacha, where they drunkenly try to make sense of life and then, with a nod to Chekov, chop down an apple tree, after which there is an orgy of self-reconciliation of a sort involving a chainsaw, a visit to cemeteries, a reckoning for Milka’s stepfather, and, sometime later, the planting of apple trees in Virginia. The timing of the action as well as the prose associated with all of these events is well done.

It is difficult to make sense of the ending of The Orchard, except perhaps by a tortured interpretation that the novel’s character’s lives served a purpose. But that wouldn’t be in line with Russian fatalism, certainly, and it would be out of line with the novel’s predominant imagery, which suggests that life “is just weather, wind and rain, spurts of blinding snow.” If there is closure in the novel, it occurs for Anya in Virginia, not in Russia. Gorcheva-Newberry’s novel is a tour de force regarding the indelible marks written on young lives during desperate social and political times. And it is hard to say that the novel’s characters ever come of age. There is no profound passage into adulthood, only a capitulation to the reality that nothing better is on the horizon.

Mark Zvonkovic, Reviewer and Author

Four teenagers, Anya, Milka, Trifonov and Lopatin grow inseparable in the last days of the Soviet Union—but not all of them will live to see the new world arrive in this powerful debut novel. Coming of age is always difficult but living in the USSR in the 1980s presents a different youth than I remember. Best friends, these four—the family girl, the abused daughter, the philosopher, and the player find joy in the moment in an apple orchard, dancing to Queen music! But the collapse of the Soviet Union changes their lives as teens just as it changed the country. This book opened my eyes to history in a new way, by describing friendships that change based on family, government, and intimate events. The orchard itself becomes a character of escape, peace, grief, and change.

We come to the stark realization that memory does not fade or disappear; rather, it moves us across time, connecting our past to our future, joys to sorrows. This powerful novel speaks to how we experience and process grief—for a beloved friend, a cherished ideal for a country, or for youth itself.

I loved this book—it was thoughtful, full of emotions and helped me understand the Soviet culture. I labeled it as a historical novel but I think it’s perhaps a book of our times.

Thank you- Ballantine Books, NetGalley and the author of this beautiful novel, Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry for this ARC.

The Soviet Union in the 1980’s was a foreign topic for me before reading this poignant novel that depicts life turning this decade until the 2010’s. The story follows Anya and Milka as they navigate their teenage years during life behind the Iron Curtain while trying to capture a real teenage adolescence through the music of Freddy Mercury and anything that gave them an outlet to a life beyond the IC.

Along with Milka and Anya, the story follows Anya’s parents and Grandmother as they also try to hold onto living in a desolate Soviet Era where Oligarchs controlled and owned most of the nation’s wealth while the Soviet people were left with very little. The family’s dacha is a symbol of pride for the family and when an old family friend comes to tell them they need to sell or else the family comes to a turning point of how to approach the new Russia.

The story is phenomenal and I would highly recommend, ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️✨

Thank you so much Random House/Ballantine Books for this joyous advanced ebook!.

The Orchard was such a fabulous story! At first I'm not going to lie I couldn't get into this story at first.
But I'm so glad I didn't put it down! It was such a refreshing book!
Kristina done an outstanding job here! To read more about Russian Lit was simply amazing and very intriguing.
The characters were very well created and developed. Four teenagers living during the Soviet Union!
She delivers a story with characters you care about!
A coming of age in the USSR in the 1980s we get a chance to see them change during these times!
This book is heartbreaking and emotional. Its one that I will recommend to anyone!

Thanks again NetGalley, Publisher and Author for the chance to read and review this amazing book!
I'll post to my Social media platforms closer to pub date!

This novel is jewel-like, with many facets and many layers. Modern Russian history and its personal stories of loss and endurance are told in this beautiful-written piece. This writing will last throughout the test of time!

This book is a sometimes joyous, sometimes sad evocation of the Russian soul. The Orchard is cleverly evoked throughout the novel. "His hands were running through my hair, and it reminded me of the wind brushing through apple branches, through new tender leaves." The clear, visual descriptions take us to the Russian countryside and we learn how the Russians lived in the eighties while also learning how history pervades every family and their stories. The characters are strong and well-depicted. Within a few pages the reader starts to know and understand the characters and their family dynamics. Characters are drawn with sympathy and consideration.
The relationship between Russians and their Motherland are telling and show us how proud they are of their country while not fully understanding their complicated relationship with their own history.
This is a wonderful book for lovers of Russian literature, culture and history. The chaos of the eighties and its effect on most ordinary citizens is shown well through a small group of teenage friends.

The Orchard is primarily a coming-of-age novel about four teenagers living in the Soviet Union in the mid-1980s, listening to Queen and dreaming of running away to Paris and Rome while their parents argue about the state of the country, their unstable government, and politics in general.

The book is narrated by a teenage girl, Anya, and starts out with just her and her best friend Milka, spending most of their time either at Anya’s family’s apartment in the city or their dacha on an apple orchard. During their junior year of high-school though, Milka invites Lopatin and Trifonov over and the four of them quickly become inseparable, spending their time both in and out of school together. The first part of the book focuses on their last two years of high-school, before jumping forward 20 years to Anya living in America, where she moved after high school to complete her Ph.D.

I had some trouble getting into The Orchard at the beginning, and kept putting it down to read other books. But something made me keep picking it back up, and I’m so glad I did because I ended up loving this book! I will say that the book may need trigger warnings for references to childhood sexual assault and depictions of traumatic abortion/miscarriage. This book was heartbreaking, and I’m not sure I’d call it a typical coming-of-age novel because I likely wouldn’t recommend it to teens (not because I think they couldn’t handle it - I likely would’ve loved this book in high school and it’s not as though heartbreak is kept out of YA in general, but the book wasn’t written in a YA style and definitely seems written more for adult readers).

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The Orchard is being published March 22, 2022. Thank you so much to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the advance copy of this book!

This book was amazing. I felt like I knew a lot about communism and Russia, but this book completely changed my perspective. I saw both sides of the coin, the ones that feared change and preferred communism and those who wanted a different life and freedom. Wonderfully written and captivating.