Petropolis

Petropolis

In her stunning debut novel, Anya Ulinich delivers a funny and unforgettable story of a Russian mail-order bride trying to find her place in America. After losing her father, her boyfriend, and her baby, Sasha Goldberg decides that getting herself to the United States is the surest path to deliverance. But she finds that life in Phoenix with her Red Lobster-loving fiancé isn't much better than life in Siberia, and so she treks across America on a misadventure-filled search for her long- lost father. Petropolis is a deeply moving story about the unexpected connections that create a family and the faraway places that we end up calling home. "Audacious, clever, and lively . . . a nervy social satire in the spirit of Tom Wolfe, Aleksandar Hemon, Gish Jen, Gary Shteyngart, and Lara Vapnyar." - Chicago Tribune "Ulinich has a knack for the tragicomic. . . . Petropolis is engaging, funny, and genuinely moving in all the right places." - Los Angeles Times Book Review "A moving account of a perpetual outsider's desire to belong, both to her family and to the wide, weird world she encounters with a sometimes weary heart and plenty of chutzpah." - USA Today "A beautiful far-ranging voice equally at home on both sides of the Atlantic . . . Anya Ulinich's satiric romp gives new meaning to the word 'bittersweet.'" -Gary Shteyngart, author of Absurdistan and The Russian Debutante's Handbook Anya Ulinich was seventeen when her family left Moscow and immigrated to the United States. She attended the Art Institute of Chicago and received an MFA in painting from the University of California. She lives in Brooklyn, New York. An Unspoiled Quality A CORRUGATED FENCE RAN THE ENTIRE LENGTH OF A STREET WITH NO NAME, until itcrossed another street with no name. At the end of the fence, there were sixevenly spaced brick apartment buildings and a grocery. Just under thebuildings' cornices, meter-high letters spelled: glory to the, soviet army, brushteeth, after eatin, welcome to, asbestos 2, and model town! The letters, red and peeling, were painted along the seams in thebrickwork, which forced the authors of the slogans to be less concerned withtheir meaning than with the finite number of bricks in each facade. In the fall of 1992, Lubov Alexandrovna Goldberg decided to findan extracurricular activity for her fourteen–year–old daughter. "Children of the intelligentsia don't just come home in theafternoon and engage in idiocy," declared Mrs. Goldberg. She would've loved it if Sasha played the piano, but the Goldbergsdidn't have a piano, and there wasn't even space for a hypothetical piano inthe two crowded rooms where Sasha and her mother lived. Mrs. Goldberg's second choice was the violin. She liked to imaginethe three–quarter view of Sasha in black and white, minus the frizzy bangs. This is Sasha practicingher violin. As you can see, there is a place for the arts in the increasingausterity of our lives, she wrote in herimaginary letter to Mr. Goldberg, whose address she didn't know. But after themoney was spent and the violin purchased, three consecutive violin instructorsdeclared Sasha profoundly tone deaf and musically uneducable. "A bear stepped on her ear," Mrs. Goldbergcomplained to the neighbors, and Sasha thought about the weight of the bear andwhether in stepping on her ear the animal would also destroy her head, crackingit like a walnut. "Sit up,Sasha," said Mrs. Goldberg, "and chew with your mouth closed." Then came auditions for ballet and figure–skatingclasses, which even Mrs. Goldberg knew were a long shot for Sasha. On the wayhome from the last skating audition, where the instructor delicately describedher daughter as overweight and uncoordinated, Lubov Alexandrovna walked twosteps ahead of Sasha in a tense and loaded silence. Trudging through the snowbehind her mother, Sasha contemplated the street lamps. She tried to determinethe direction of the wind by the trajectories of snowflakes in the circles oflight, but the snow seemed to be flying every which way. Sasha was staringstraight up when her foot hit the curb and she landed flat on her face in asnowbank. This was more than Mrs. Goldberg could take. "I told you to stop taking such wide steps. Youwant to see what you look like walking? Here!" Mrs. Goldberg swung her armswildly and took a giant step. "See? This is why you fall all the time! You tripover your own feet!" Sasha got up and dusted herself off. Her right coatsleeve was packed with snow all the way up to her elbow, and the anticipationof it melting made her shiver. "I have some advice for you!" shrieked Mrs.Goldberg. "Watch your step! You should see yourself in the mirror, the way youmove!" Sasha woke up and stared at the water stain on the ceiling. For awhile, her eyes were empty. She allowed the horror of life to seep into themgradually, replacing the traces of forgotten dreams. It was the first day ofwinter recess. The Fruit Day. Mrs. Goldberg had a new dietfor Sasha: each week, six