Refugees after WWII, they were a typical family who must start over in modern England living out the immigrant experience. The main characters (both sisters, their dead mother and elderly father) are interesting and reasonably well developed, meaningful without sliding into caricature, apart perhaps from Valentina. The Ukrainian political situation and history are very well analyzed (albeit indirectly, through dialogue--btw, the author has a great gift for dialogue). A Short History Of Tractors In Ukrainian is advertised as being an extremely comical take on family drama. I think I may have actually not enjoyed this book because, and I am going to level with people here, I am prejudiced against Ukrainians.

She exploded into our lives like a fluffy pink grenade, churning up the murky water, bringing to the surface a sludge of sloughed-off memories, giving the family ghosts a kick up the backside.A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian was bestselling author Marina Lewycka's bestselling debut novel which has sold over one million copies worldwide. Whether that's putting new work on stages across the world or supporting our outreach and learning programmes, every purchase you make really does make a difference.

Maybe there was some black comedy element I was missing, but to me I just didn't find an old man being abused, war and people mispronouncing English words amusing. Once I had understood how much she was prepared to sacrifice in her desire to better herself, and her commitment to her son, it was hard to be wholly unsympathetic. Am râs mult cu familia asta ucraineano-engleză excentrică și cu "invadatorii" lor ucraineni, care caută o viață mai bună in Occident, dar găsesc cu totul altceva decât și-au imaginat. It's funny, touching, humane, disturbing, interesting by turns and frankly, a story I was sad to finish and will read again.So instead of sympathizing with all the characters, you feel like they all deserved what they got, and should just go on being miserable. Quick summary: Two sisters are estranged because of a mysterious event that happened 40 years ago in the Old Country. It makes you realize how complicated we are - how we can be brilliant in some areas of our lives and then complete idiots in others, without even noticing it, much to the detriment of our loved ones. There was no good reason for my hesitance – the book has glowing reviews and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize – for some reason it just didn’t appeal to me.

L’Ucraina ha storia particolare, il racconto arriva fino ai famigerati anni Trenta, quelli del terribile Holomodor. A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian also aims to be at least partially a presentation of Ukrainian history - published in a Western country and aimed towards a Western audience, and one which doesn't know much about the country (though with current events taking place there we've seen a sudden and amazing increase in experts on all things Ukraine - most of whom probably couldn't find it on the map a few months before). What does Nadia mean when she says that she and her sister quarrel over “the inheritance of character, of nature”? I felt so sympathetic to the storyline, particularly to the elderly father ( I am 92 myself) and the younger daughter. Nadezhda (Nadia for short) and her Big Sis, Vera, lost their mother two years ago and have been fighting ever since over the will.The other touch I admired was the way the family's past ordeals in Ukraine are introduced often quite obliquely, hinted at rather than fully drawn, and are the more haunting for that. It is the story of a Ukrainian family of four that emigrated to England after the end of the second world war. In the end, I wrote a different novel, but my mother’s story is in there, threaded in among all the other stories.