The Red Passport
Stories
By Katherine Shonk
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Hardcover, 9780374248475, 224pp.)
Publication Date: November 2003
Other Editions of This Title: Paperback
Categories: Short Stories (single author)
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A beguiling debut collection set in the "New Russia" about love, dislocation, and the struggle to get a foothold in a changing world
The eight unpredictable, poignant, and often comic stories that make up Katherine Shonk's The Red Passport portray the tumult, hopes, and disappointments of Russians and visiting Americans alike in post-Communist Russia. Many of the Russians in these stories are strangers in their own country, learning to navigate a new landscape of Dunkin Donuts franchises that flourish where consumer culture had so recently been anathema; where the fall of the Soviet Union has not in fact brought about peace or prosperity; and where people still find a way to reach out and for love, despite often disastrous results. "My Mother's Garden" reads like a parable of broken promises--an old woman living near Chernobyl does not understand why she can't eat those robust, lovely, enormous onions, better than any she'd grown for decades. "Our American" is set in Moscow and tells the story of a thirteen year old boy who watches with fascination and dread as his older brother, a veteran of the Chechen war, pursues the naïve American girl next door. "The Young People of Moscow" describes an extraordinary day in the life of an aging Russian couple selling Soviet poetry in an underground bazaar. In her elegantly crafted stories Shonk delves deeply into these people, finding both the nub of their disappointment and the truth of their good intentions. Describing a place that is at once exotic and disconcertingly familiar, The Red Passport is a moving and startling book that doles out amazement and delight in equal measure.
Katherine Shonk was born in Chicago and lives in Evanston, Illinois. Her stories have appeared in Tin House, Story Quarterly, and American Short Fiction and have been reprinted in Best American Short Stories.
"I read these stories with rising excitement: here is an American writer intimate with contemporary Russian life and bounding with literary talent. In these wise, graceful and profoundly empathetic stories, Katherine Shonk celebrates the historic encounter between the American and Russian civilizations, which continues to enrich both their people."
--Ken Kalfus, author of The Commissariat of Enlightenment
"The Red Passport is an absorbing look at a fast changing Russia--I loved it. This is smart and generous work, and Katherine Shonk has a voice all her own."
-- Gary Shteyngart, author of The Russian Debutante’s Handbook
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