Requiem for the East

Book excerpt: An extraordinary, profoundly moving and thought-provoking novel tracing the rise and fall of communism through its impact on three generations of one family: the narrator's grandfather, who deserted from the Red Army in the chaotic aftermath of the 1917 revolution; his father, who survived the Eastern front in WWII only to be killed with his wife in one of Stalin's purges; and the narrator himself - Soviet army doctor turned spy who, after the fall of communism, discovers his missing girlfriend was betrayed by a double-agent and flies to Florida bent on revenge. A searing portrait of the suffering caused in the name of politics, yet also a celebration of ordinary people's decency, compassion and courage.