Lea Ypi's memoir Free tells her story of growing up in Albania at the end of the Stalinist era. Ypi is an academic in fields like politics, philosophy and economics, areas that I definitely am not super strong in. I enjoyed the book, but was a bit lost at times, likely because of my limited knowledge of the politics and communism. If that is something you have an interest in or some background knowledge in, then I think it would be a great book for you! Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me the chance to read and review this book.

I requested Free as background reading for a First Impressions Program booked via Kezia in marketing. Personally, I think the book is tremendous, and our member-reviewers agreed. Because of the overall positive reviews, in addition to the activity related to the First Impressions Promotion, we also featured the book editorially as a "Today's Top Pick" for a week across most BookBrowse pages.

Review and article were sent to Kezia at the time:
Review:
https://www.bookbrowse.com/mag/reviews/index.cfm/ref/fk281344/free#reviews
Beyond the Book:
https://www.bookbrowse.com/mag/btb/index.cfm/ref/fk281344/free#btb

Lea Ypi’s Free: A Child and a Country at the End of History functions as a kind of memoir in connected stories: It’s not really a traditional narrative memoir but it’s also not quite essays. This loose format really worked for me, and I thought Ypi did a great job of tying together important points — both on a personal and broader level — from earlier stories to later ones.

She has that special gift of being able to write from a child’s perspective as an adult, and weaves together memories and specific scenes using the benefit of hindsight and with a bent towards demonstrating what these incidents meant in the context of Albanian life at the time.

I did feel some remove on the author’s part from some of the more emotionally affecting events that I would’ve expected more insight into. Still, the perspectives into a country and era that haven’t gotten a lot of attention on the world stage is so valuable and I found the writing engaging and lovely.

I didn’t think that it provided quite as much of a wider historical background as necessary, which I think might hamper understanding if you’re lacking it, but having read Mud Sweeter Than Honey this didn’t bother me. These two books would make an excellent read-together.

Ypi's memoir covered her childhood and teenage years living through the transition of Albania from socialism to democracy/capitalism. Viewing the change from the perspective of a child/teen was very interesting. Ypi didn't always understand the political/social rules in place in society and often found herself questioning things that an adult may not due to realizing those questions are socially considered out of bounds. Ypi's family was interesting and complex and I enjoyed getting to know their unique personalities. This memoir was interesting and complex, reflecting on what "freedom" means and how neither socialism nor capitalism truly embraces all aspects of freedom. Ypi wasn't afraid to embrace and critique aspects of both systems and have a nuanced view.

"Free" by Lea Ypi is the story of the author's life growing up before and after the fall of Stalinist Albania. While not the full intention of this book, "Free" was an education in the history of Albania over the last couple hundred years. Until the fall of the government, Ypi is raised in a house in which the family has been stripped of their land and wealth and they fledge fake allegiance to the government to prevent themselves from getting imprisoned or killed. Ypi innocently undermines her family's attempts at fake loyalty and humorously describes their daily lives in a country where people's belongings and freedom have been reduced to the bare minimum. After the government's dissolution, chaos ensues, the truth of Ypi's family comes out, and she eventually flees to England. I really loved this book both for the writing and reading about a topic that was very new to me.

Free is a captivating coming-of-age autobiography of author Lea Ypi growing up in a port city of Albania in the 1980s and 1990s. Won the 2021 Baillie Gifford Non-fiction Prize and will be released 18th January 2022. Thanks to WW Norton and Company for providing a digital ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

In current day, Lea Ypi teaches political theory and specifically Marxism at the London School of Economics. This book is unique in that it contains a first hand account of day-to-day existence living under a socialist system through the eyes of a child educated under its beliefs but also effectively dissects the different political philosophies exemplified by the members of the Ypi household. Even though it's been a month since I finished reading, I can still remember vividly remember interesting details such as the use of a can or pot used to preserve a person's position in a line or the absolute silence at a gathering when Lea blabbed to some family friends her family's refusal to put up a picture of Enver Hoxha in their living room. Many inexplicable occurrences that are described such as her family having the wrong 'biography', her grandmother insistence on her learning French before Albanian and everyone's obsession on what subject people are studying at university give the reader an inkling of what's really happening. The reveal occurs at 42% into the book when the one party system crumbled in 1990 and Ypi's unusual personal family history is also unveiled. What happens to Albania in the aftermath is quite instructive: mass unemployment, hordes leaving by boats, influx of Western NGOs and American organizations, a decrease in collective community spirit and trust (concurrent with a mass increase in pyramid schemes). Ypi likens it to shock therapy ECT used for psychiatric patients and notes with irony how western countries which were encouraging them to throw off the shackles of socialism now rush to close their borders and repudiate desperate Albanians. Ypi also notes how the practical lived experience of Socialist countries such as Albania, Cuba, Vietnam are dismissed by her Western Socialist friends who idolize Trotsky and Guevara.

For a more erudite review: https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/11/albanian-communism-lea-ypi-memoir-free-end-of-history-book-review

All in all, Free is informative and gripping written decisively by a passionate intellectual.