Knyzhka Corner Book Reviews

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Timothy Snyder’s, The Red Prince: The Secret Lives of a Habsburg Archduke. Who can resist a romantic Hapsburg hero who openly embraces the cause of Ukrainian nationalism in the early 20th century? Wilhelm von Habsburg was such a man. Although he died in obscurity in…

In this edition of Knyzhka Corner: Communism and Hunger – The Ukrainian, Chinese, Kazakh, and Soviet Famines in Comparative Perspective edited by Andrea Graziosi and Frank E. Sysyn. Communism and Hunger is a collection of scholarly articles examining the similarities and differences of the pan-Soviet famine of 1931-1933, the Ukrainian Holodomor, the Kazakh great hunger, and…

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Leslie Peirce’s Empress of the East, the biography of Roxelana, a captive slave who became the wife of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent. Empress of the East is a profoundly insightful look at one of the most mysterious figures of the sixteenth century. Roxelana was a…

Knyzhka Corner: Ukrainian stories, in English. Skrypuch, Marsha Forchuk. MAKING BOMBS FOR HITLER. Scholastic Canada Ltd., 2012. 186 p. ISBN 978-1-4431-0730-3 Available at Chapters, Amazon and Barnes and Noble Reviewed by Myra Junyk In this edition of Knyzhka Corner, we will be discussing Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch’s novel, Making Bombs for Hitler. The novel begins in…

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Vasyl Shkliar’s novel, Raven’s Way. Raven’s Way was first published in 2009 in Ukraine with the title Black Raven.  It has recently been translated by Stephen Komarnyckyj and published in English by Kalyna Language Press. It won the Taras Shevchenko Award in 2011, the most…

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Maurice Mierau’s award-winning memoir, Detachment: An Adoption Memoir. Readers first meet an emotionally drained Maurice in 2009 in a psychologist’s office in Winnipeg. For three years, his wife Betsy has been urging him to get help. He tells the psychologist, “I have problems in my…

Bill Browder’s fascinating new book Red Notice, is a roller-coaster ride through post-Soviet Russian history. Bill Browder was one of the architects of Russia’s growing economy during the privatization era. He saw an opportunity to make a great deal of money and created the Hermitage Capital investment fund based in Moscow. Browder became the largest…

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch’s new novel, Dance of the Banished. Dance of the Banished explores the tragic history of Canadian internment camps and the Armenian genocide. It is a story of injustice, prejudice and violence. Skrypuch’s novel is loosely based on actual events, and it was…

In this edition of Knyzhka Corner, we look at two books for middle grade readers by Manitoba author Gabriele Goldstone. Red Stone tells the story of Stalin’s cruel destruction of the kulak way of life during the 1930’s, through the eyes of eleven-year old Katya Halter. In the companion volume, Broken Stone, Goldstone picks up…