An unforgettable debut novel about the journey of three women and one extremely endangered snail through contemporary Ukraine
‘A fierce and funny road-trip novel ‘ GUARDIAN, the 50 hottest books to read right now
‘A thrilling ride’ FINANCIAL TIMES
‘Brilliant and heart-stopping’ LOS ANGELES TIMES
‘Startling and ambitious‘ NEW YORK TIMES
‘Animated by dark humor and cool fury’ NEW YORKER
‘Virtuosic’ NPR
‘Dexterous and formally inventive’ MARCEL THEROUX, GUARDIAN BOOK OF THE DAY
‘Remarkable’ WASHINGTON POST
Ukraine, 2022. Yeva is a maverick scientist who scours the country’s forests and valleys, trying and failing to breed rare snails while her relatives urge her to settle down and start a family of her own. What they don’t know: Yeva already dates plenty of men-not for love, but to fund her work-entertaining Westerners who come to Ukraine on guided romance tours believing they’ll find docile brides untainted by feminism.
Nastia and her sister, Solomiya, are also entangled in the booming marriage industry, posing as a hopeful bride and her translator while secretly searching for their missing mother, who vanished after years of fierce activism against the romance tours.
So begins a journey of a lifetime across a country on the brink of war: three angry women, a truckful of kidnapped bachelors, and Lefty, a last-of-his-kind snail with one final shot at perpetuating his species.
‘A fierce and funny road-trip novel ‘ GUARDIAN, the 50 hottest books to read right now
‘A thrilling ride’ FINANCIAL TIMES
‘Brilliant and heart-stopping’ LOS ANGELES TIMES
‘Startling and ambitious‘ NEW YORK TIMES
‘Animated by dark humor and cool fury’ NEW YORKER
‘Virtuosic’ NPR
‘Dexterous and formally inventive’ MARCEL THEROUX, GUARDIAN BOOK OF THE DAY
‘Remarkable’ WASHINGTON POST
Ukraine, 2022. Yeva is a maverick scientist who scours the country’s forests and valleys, trying and failing to breed rare snails while her relatives urge her to settle down and start a family of her own. What they don’t know: Yeva already dates plenty of men-not for love, but to fund her work-entertaining Westerners who come to Ukraine on guided romance tours believing they’ll find docile brides untainted by feminism.
Nastia and her sister, Solomiya, are also entangled in the booming marriage industry, posing as a hopeful bride and her translator while secretly searching for their missing mother, who vanished after years of fierce activism against the romance tours.
So begins a journey of a lifetime across a country on the brink of war: three angry women, a truckful of kidnapped bachelors, and Lefty, a last-of-his-kind snail with one final shot at perpetuating his species.
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Reviews
In Maria Reva's all-around brilliant novel Endling, the fate of some snails serves as a harbinger for the fate of Ukraine. The book is funny and smart, full of science, longing and adventure, all the while reminding us what the world stands to lose, and what it has already lost. This is essential reading
Ironic, sharp, and wise, this is a big (meta)fictional achievement
Suspenseful and powered by a rare urgency
Maria Reva's dazzling debut novel Endling will take you on a ride you will never forget. Into this brilliant stew of a novel the fearless Reva stirs Ukraine's notorious "romance tour" industry, feminist activists, a kidnapping caper, the fine science of snail conservation, the eternal mysteries of family dynamics and Europe's first major land war since World War II. Only a supremely talented writer could handle material like this, and Reva--who seems incapable of writing a dud sentence--shows she's more than up to the task. Open this book, fasten your seatbelt, and brace for impact
Heartbreaking, hilarious, profound, and vital, Endling is a brilliant, visceral journey that pulses with a powerful sense of urgency and relevance to our times
Startling and ambitious
A virtuosic debut novel ... Starting out as a straightforward story about a Ukrainian biologist, this witty, shape-shifting book turns into something trickier and more interesting ... Indeed, for all her humor and brio - she's never, ever preachy - Reva knows what she's joking about
Gripping . . . neither a work of magical realism nor auto-fiction or memoir, but an original piece encapsulating elements of all three'
Wild, exhilarating, heartbreaking...Over and over again, Endling delivers flashes of beauty and grace and dares us to see hope amidst wreckage and ruin
A fierce and funny road-trip novel which is - literally - interrupted by Russia's invasion
Inventive and powerful. The reminders that these characters are fiction emphasises that the horror and the violence are real
A dexterous and formally inventive debut novel ... Reva shares with us personal details about her connection with Ukraine, as well as her awareness of the war and the artistic challenge she faces: can anyone in good conscience make fiction out of these tragic events? The answer to that question is resoundingly affirmative.
Remarkable . . . Reva tests the boundaries of storytelling with freshness and humour
Full of suspense and humor, while never letting go of what is really happening in the lives of Ukrainian people at home and abroad . . . A noteworthy literary achievement and also a good story, sure to be widely discussed and enjoyed.
Astonishing . . . this inspired and urgent novel is bound to make a major splash
Brilliant and heart-stopping
This work on feminist outrage, environmental destruction, and the inhumanity of war is not didactic; instead, it is a page-turning, genre-bending meta-novel as entertaining as it is gut-wrenching, whose experiments with literary form will keep readers on their toes
Maria Reva has made a fantastic novel. It's about so much and yet is laser focused. A scientist who funds her research with sex work, a wild and, at the same time, sensible and normal move. This novel turns corners and tables. I love works that are smarter than I am and this is one
A thrilling ride . . . Tender but never mawkish . . . Reva is breaking down the molecules of fiction to get at a 'broader, truer truth' through her combination of drama, self-examination and, notably, humour
Animated by dark humor and cool fury