about the book
Sasha Zaichik is a staunch Communist, even at the age of ten. Tomorrow, bursting with pride, he’ll be inducted into the Young Soviet Pioneers. He idolizes his father, who will be officiating at the ceremony. An extremely devoted communist, his father is a highly regarded member of Stalin’s State Security Secret Police.
Sasha has been preparing since he was one. By six he knew all the rules. Most importantly, a Young Pioneer is devoted to Comrade Stalin and Communism. His responsibility is to root out the shortcomings of others, and it is his duty to turn in anyone who breaks the rules, no matter how small the infraction.
With blind loyalty, Sasha believes the lies and half truths he hears about Stalin’s glorious leadership. He rationalizes and ignores the anomalies he sees. He lives in Moscow in a tiny apartment with 46 other Russians. The ghetto-like communal lifestyle is supposed to make them better Communists. In reality the people are desperately poor and the country is governed through fear, and everyone is encouraged to betray each another. Forced false confessions, even among schoolchildren, mean that thousands are imprisoned and executed for even the smallest “crimes.” Sasha’s father has always been the one who does the arresting…until this night!
An envious man who lives in an even more wretched apartment lies about Sasha’s father. As Sasha watches helplessly, the Secret Police drags his father off in the middle of the night. Sasha, now a son of the “enemy of the people,” is thrown out onto the icy cold streets, homeless and penniless.
The next day he goes to school, hoping that they’ll have realized his father’s arrest was a mistake. It only gets worse. Sasha’s whole world shatters and his life changes forever. Disillusioned by his ardent beliefs about Stalin and Communism, he is forced to examine his own perceptions and values. But now, how will he survive?
about the author
What an amazing country! Newly immigrated Eugene Yelchin opened the newspaper classified page and was stunned by all the ads seeking painters. A Russian-born artist who knew little English, Eugene didn’t realize that these painters were needed for walls…not fine art canvases!
Eugene grew up in the arts; his mother ran Russia’s best ballet academy. He spent his youth back stage and went on to graduate from the Leningrad Institute of Theater Arts, designing sets and costumes. Inspired by his father’s hidden banned books, he decided to move to America. When he put in his application, he suddenly became a person non-grata in Russia.
After arriving in Boston in 1983, Eugene took his portfolio around looking for stage work. At the Boston Globe, a language misunderstanding led Eugene into a job doing editorial illustrations for the newspaper. Since then his art has appeared in many magazines, newspapers, and advertising campaigns. He even designed the original polar bears for the Coca Cola ads!
After earning a second master’s degree in film at the University of Southern California, he designed animated characters and directed commercials. During this time, he continued to paint avant-garde fine art pieces with much success. He also went on to illustrate and write children’s books, receiving a Newbery Honor for Breaking Stalin’s Nose. The book is based on his own experiences in the USSR. Like his lead character in the book, Eugene’s life in Russia revolved around fear and poverty. While growing up, Eugene’s family of five shared a small one-bedroom apartment with several other families. His bed was a cot set up each night under the dining room table. Drawing became his way to escape the drudgery and the fear.
Now Eugene speaks just about perfect English and the only house he ever paints is his own. He currently lives in Topanga, California, with his wife, Mary Kuryla, a fellow writer, and their two children, Isaac and Ezra.
Sources:
Author website
Author interview: Publisher’s Weekly
Author video interview: ALA Youth Media Awards
Book trailer: Breaking Stalin’s Nose
Also by Eugene Yelchin:
The Haunting of Falcon House. Henry Holt & Company (BYR). June 2016.
Arcady’s Goal. Henry Holt & Company (BYR). 2014.
read more!
Arcady’s Goal by Eugene Yelchin
Orphan Arcady copes with his difficult life in a Soviet children’s home by spending as much time as possible playing soccer. When Ivan Ivanych, a man who lost his wife to the Stalinist purges, takes Arcady in and offers to coach him, it transforms both of their lives in profound ways.
Catch You Later, Traitor by Avi
In 1951 Brooklyn, New York, Pete spends his time following the Giants baseball team and trying to be a detective. Then the FBI shows up accusing Pete’s father of being a Communist, and Pete’s classmates turn against him. Pete decides to uncover the truth, but worries it could put his family’s livelihood and freedom at risk.
Revolution Is Not a Dinner Party by Ying Chang Compestine
In 1972 China, Ling, the daughter of two doctors, struggles to make sense of the communists’ Cultural Revolution, which empties stores of food, burns books, drags her father off claiming he is a class enemy, and denounces her long hair as bourgeois.