The Denouncer
A Novel
by Paul M. Levitt
This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
Send NetGalley books directly to your Kindle or Kindle app
1
To read on a Kindle or Kindle app, please add kindle@netgalley.com as an approved email address to receive files in your Amazon account. Click here for step-by-step instructions.
2
Also find your Kindle email address within your Amazon account, and enter it here.
Pub Date Aug 11 2014 | Archive Date Aug 15 2014
Rowman & Littlefield | Taylor Trade
Description
Denunciation
became so commonplace under Stalin that people regarded it as their
patriotic duty to spy on others and even expose members of their own
family. The original Bolsheviks, for reasons of ideological purity, put
great store in transparency. But under Stalin, transparency evolved into
a state of constant surveillance.
In
the late 1930s, a young man named Sasha Parsky kills two soldiers who
come to arrest his parents as kulaks. He escapes arrest—though not
suspicion. Sasha, now under greater scrutiny, is asked by Boris Filatov,
the chief of the local secret police, to take a position as the head of
a small boys’ school with the condition that Sasha spy on the previous
director, who was dismissed for political reasons.
As
Sasha’s visits to the exiled man turn into discussions on politics and
Sasha begins making changes at the school, it is only a matter of time
before anonymous letters denouncing him arrive on Filatov’s desk. But
even more ominous is the arrival of two men from the past who have the
knowledge to do Sasha great harm. Caught between Filatov and the fear of
exposure, Sasha hazards all in testing the fidelity of a loved one.
The author of plays, novels, children’s books, medical books, and scholarly works, Paul M. Levitt teaches English at the University of Colorado, Boulder, where he has won awards for teaching and scholarship.
A Note From the Publisher
You are viewing unedited page proofs. Quote only from finished book. Contact publicity@rowman.com for more info.
Advance Praise
PRAISE FOR LEVITT'S PREVIOUS WORK - STALIN'S BARBER
Levitt
is ambitiously epic. . . . With equal parts comedy and tragedy, Levitt
vividly illustrates the darkly humorous experience of life in a
totalitarian state, where no one can be trusted and the law is removed
from reason. . . . The novel soars when Levitt brings [all of] the
strands together in the second half.
— Publishers Weekly
This
fascinating novel is easy to admire . . . [it] captures [the] horror
[of Stalin’s 1930s Russia] and yet maintains an undercurrent of
absurdist humor. . . . Levitt’s powerful narrative variously suggests
Chaplin’s Great Dictator, Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, Voltaire’s Candide, Heller’s Catch-22 and Brecht’s Mother Courage, but remains an entirely original, entirely remarkable work of the imagination. — The Washington Post
Let’s
just leave it that this is tale well-told (no surprise, the author is a
playwright), full of philosophy and surreal humor, excellent characters
and gripping action, to say nothing of some good history. That the
protagonist is a barber offers an exceedingly intimate view of things we
might previously have thought to be rather grand scale. — Russian Life
Readers’
joy in peeling back the layers of this historical novel for themselves.
Let’s just leave it that this is tale well told (no surprise the author
is a playwright), full of philosophy and surreal humor, excellent
characters and gripping action, to say nothing of some good history.
That the protagonist is a barber offers an exceedingly intimate view of
things we might previously have thought to be rather grand scale. — Russian Review
Marketing Plan
National online review campaign
Author radio interviews
National online review campaign
Author radio interviews
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781589799677 |
| PRICE | $24.95 (USD) |
