A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian: Marina Lewycka (Penguin Essentials, 71)

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I don't usually like this kind of book, but I was totally hooked it kept me up at night a couple of times - it's that good. It had an okay pace and style and a collection of interesting themes, but the themes were not developed and the characters were a little two dimensional. Now they are brought together by a common goal: to prevent their 84 year old father, Nikolai, from marrying a Ukrainian gold digger with big boobs. I can't figure out the target audience, how was it shortlisted for the Orange prize (just a pun on Ukraine's Orange Revolution?

Does she really want the best possible life for her son, is she simply after money, or does she seek love and contentment for herself?There is an attempt at incorporating many zany characters along the way, and we learn about Vera and Nadezhda's strained relationship, and their relationship with their kooky father. Although there might be happiness and unhappiness in this family, I don't think they stop to think and dwell on it that much. Nadezhda and her shaken family must face the ghosts of their past, confront their heritage and rediscover relationships. Despite the dark memories and family feud raging between the sisters, it was still a warmhearted story. Consider also how it functions in the novel to provide crucial information for the reader about history and ideology.

There were moments of good dialogue, and some things that made this child of immigrants sort of smile and roll her eyes.The "funny" that I was expecting from the back cover blurb is more of a smile-through-the-tears and throw-your-hands-up-in-the-air-in-resignation kind than simple side-splitting laughter. So: two embittered, estranged sisters have to work together to help save their aging father from the much younger woman who has her talons in him / parents came from the Ukraine and survived war and purges and internment camps and other horrors / dad is (when not trying to fondle his new wife's big fake tits) writing the definitive history of tractors. I’ve found that writing is a strange process—you don’t really know your characters at the outset of a book any more than the reader does. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average.