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What are readers saying about The End of Sorrow? "I loved the book. It kept me reading literally all weekend! I loved the characters, the story line, and learning more about the siege of Leningrad. I have been and am most fascinated with information about the Second World War. Though your book stunningly gives an account of the horror and devastation of the siege, we readers are spared unnecessary sexual exploits and unbearable violence. I thank you for that. I've been having difficulty finding reading material I truly want to read since leaving school. I really, really like the book and the way you put it together." - Bette from Massachusetts |
| "You've written an absolutely beautiful book." - Dick from North Carolina |
| "The novel compellingly propels you through a dark episode of history -- and I mean propel. I did not want to stop reading! Felix and Katya's love story in wartime is one I won't forget." - Phil from New York |
| "I very much enjoyed The End of Sorrow. It was one of those books I got caught up in. At the end, I shed a few tears and also mourned that these people were leaving my life. I wanted to know more about them, to be with them in their next steps." - Eileen from North Carolina |
The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic. —Joseph Stalin
 One million people perished during the nine hundred day Siege of Leningrad, but the city didn’t fall. This superb literary novel takes pains with historical facts and the details of daily living during the mass starvation, but it transcends the merely good with evolutionary characters, wholly fictional ones backed by real public figures. The End of Sorrow succeeds in revaluing the lives Stalin rationalized away.
The plight of the under-trained, badly equipped Russian army, and guerilla tactics of the behind-the-lines Partisans are described through Felix. Reluctantly separated from his fiancé, he illustrates the shifting outlook of soldiers becoming accustomed to killing and hardship. Felix’s childhood friend Dima is a true-believing party ideologue, an executor of enlisted deserters, hated by those under his command, unwilling to surrender ground to the advancing German army. Another character, Petya, has the tormented psyche of a Raskolnikov, displaying increasingly irrational and paranoid ideation. A frustrated writer at the beginning, Petya is jealous of the success of his neighbor, Dmitry Shostakovich. The iconic composer is modest, private, and mildly dismayed by the Communist Party’s denunciation of his music as overly formalist.
The in-city story centers on Katya, an unconflicted heroine who plans to marry if Felix returns from the Front. Her religious views (uncommon to profess in the Soviet era), including commitment to nonviolence and tolerance, were transmitted from a dissident Mennonite grandmother. “‘But what if what people call evil is simply a result of men and women making bad decisions, trying to get something they want?’” Katya’s moment of greatness comes when she alone prevents an unabsorbable cut in civilian food rationing, at the personal expense of citywide employment blacklisting. As nutrition declines in Leningrad, irrational behavior comes to the fore. Dreams, the guidance of interior voices, and the main protagonist’s prescience regarding who will soon be killed enrich the drama.
The classical Russian form lives on; this novel is no pale imitation. Author J. V. Love’s style clearly integrates aspects of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. His audience doesn’t need explicit mentions of War and Peace and Crime and Punishment in order to conceptualize the links to those pillars. Some topical content subtly comments on today’s political mood, showing that the natures of governments and wars are fairly static: “Nobody wanted to try to understand anyone else. Nobody was interested in the truth or honesty or good intentions. No matter the country, leaders seemed to prey on people’s fears.”
The author is an alumnus of the Gotham Writers Workshop, and a recently ordained Interfaith Minister. The latter informs existential discussion of the starving. Love salutes the resilient and honors the more fragile, but stands far enough back to conceptualize a broader humanism. The End of Sorrow is a triumph of craft, a rock-solid, gratifying choice for discerning fans of serious literature.
Reviewed by Todd MercerForeWord Clarion Reviews |
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The Historical Novel Society
In 1941, Nazi Germany broke the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact by invading an ill-prepared Russia and faced a Red Army paralyzed by its own political purges and shortage of weapons. The novel primarily follows the tale of Felix and Katya, a pair of lovers, as they cope with the terror and trials of the siege of Leningrad. Skillfully-drawn locations and carefully-nuanced characters make this book emotionally devastating at times, with the depiction of the unimaginable horrors of the conflict, as well as bittersweet at the poignant moments that celebrate life. The book explores what people become when faced with soul-stealing violence and the difficult battle to retain humanity and decency in the face of dehumanizing events. In this case, the dehumanizing events reach beyond the war and anonymous violence to corrupt government, prejudice, and selfish impulse. The city of Leningrad, now known as St. Petersburg, is almost a character in itself. Despite the devastation and ruin, the city continues to live in the hard times and later blooms again with life, music, and art created during the struggle.
This story can be challenging at times, but the story is well told and likely to stay with the reader. This novel is recommended for anyone interested in the Russian/Nazi front of World War II and those looking for a moving read.
Reviewed by Amanda Yesilbas The Historical Novel Society |
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