The Rooster House, Victoria Belim
The Rooster House, Victoria Belim
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
Club: $9.99

The Rooster House
My Ukrainian Family Story: A Memoir

Author: Victoria Belim

Narrator: Amrita Acharia

Unabridged: 8 hr 4 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 06/27/2023


Synopsis

A timely and deeply moving story of family, history, and Ukraine

In 2014, the landmarks of Victoria Belim’s personal geography were plunged into tumult at the hands of Russia. Her hometown, Kyiv, was gripped by protests and violence. Crimea, where she’d once been sent to school to avoid radiation from the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl, was invaded. Kharkiv,
where her grandmother Valentina studied economics and fell in love; Donetsk, where her father once worked; and Mariupol, where she and her mother bought a cherry tree for Valentina’s garden, all became battlegrounds.

Victoria, by then an American citizen living in Brussels, felt she had to go back. She had to spend time with her aging grandmother and her cousin Dima. She had to unravel a family mystery spanning several generations. And she needed to understand how a century of her country’s tragic history had
changed the course of their lives.

The Rooster House is a beautifully written memoir of a family, a country’s past, and its dangerous present. It is about parents and children, true believers and victims, gardens and art, secrets and tragedy. Compulsively readable, deeply moving, and at times laugh-out-loud funny, it is a stunning debut
book by an experienced, expressive, and gifted writer.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Nina (ninjasbooks) on May 15, 2023

I learnt a lot about Ukrainia and it’s history in the book. The author’s family history was notable, and at times I was fully engaged. There were a lot of secrets, and I admire the authors grit and passion for uncovering what she didn’t know. Maybe it was due to the audiobook, but sometimes my mind......more

Goodreads review by Ellinor on January 18, 2023

Rote Sirenen - Geschichte meiner ukrainischen Familie hat mich sehr beeindruckt. Victoria Belim erzählt darin die Geschichte ihrer Familie über ein ganzes Jahrhundert hinweg. Diese Geschichte ist zugleich die Geschichte ihres Heimatlandes, der Ukraine. Victoria Belim wurde in der Ukraine geboren und......more

Goodreads review by Elena on February 04, 2023

"Es ist schwieriger, einen Ort zu betrauern, als einen Menschen. Der Verlust einer geliebten Person ist tragisch, gehört aber zum Leben dazu. Krieg hingegen nicht. Wenn wir dabei zusehen müssen, wie unsere Heimat in Gewalt versinkt, sehnen wir uns nach der Vergangenheit zurück und hinterfragen unser......more

Goodreads review by Kate on June 25, 2023

4.5 This is a very emotional story of one family's experience in Ukraine dating back to the 1930s when an uncle of the author disappeared, along with hundreds of thousands of other during Stalin's reign of terror. The memoir is Victoria Belim's long and difficult search into exactly what happened and......more

Goodreads review by Elizabeth on October 17, 2023

I picked up this book to get some perspective on the current crisis in the Ukraine. And I listened to the audio. I listened and was entranced. Sometimes the narrator bit off words and that was distracting. This is the author's personal story about her relatives and where she is from. It fills us (th......more