Helpful Score: 1
A very intriguing novel about a largely unknown time in Soviet Russia, this story is quirky but grabbing from the start. It details the life and defiant creative process of the poet Mandelstam, a national treasure as well known as Pasternak the novelist, who runs afoul of Stalin's secret police and pays the price. It is told from several intersecting points of view, which converge at the book's end to give the reader a complete and horrifying picture of the Stalin years of terror.
