Yelena Furman

LA sunset & the Hollywood Christmas parade, a 5 min walk from me, incomprehensibly always on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Not pictured: following for several packed blocks as a car w/ Anthony Anderson drove the route (don't care about celebrities, do care about Law and Order cast regulars). I❤️LA.

Enjoying We Computers: A Ghazal Novel by Hamid Ismailov, translated from the Uzbek by Shelley Fairweather-Vega. yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300...

Poster for Romanian film festival from 27 Nov to 1 Dec in London

We don't just like Romanian literature but also Romanian films - and there's a great film festival coming up in London. Especially recommend the classic Forest of the Hanged @marinasofia.bsky.social's favourite for @jacquiwine.bsky.social

What fiction are you reading to cope with current events? Švejk or Yossarian? Any other favorites? Swing by our bookstore or your local indie bookstore for some therapeutic reading!

California voters OK new congressional lines, boosting Democrats ahead of midterms California voters have approved a ballot measure to redraw the state's congressional map to favor Democrats, marking the party's biggest victory to date in a national battle over redistricting ahead of the 2026 midterms.

JUST IN: California voters have approved a ballot measure to redraw the state's congressional map to favor Democrats, marking the party's biggest victory to date in a national battle over redistricting ahead of the 2026 midterms.

We should change the saying to, Don't mess with California, Texas (yes, I have been waiting to say this for a while. Yes, yes, yes.)

Memory Burn [Rozložíš pamet] Memory Burn, is a coming-of-age story of a queer boy from a Czech industrial town. Torcík’ delves into the recesses of memory in an effort to come to terms with painful memories from his childhood. As...

Did you miss the author event we held with Marek Torcik here in the bookstore? Memory Burn, is a coming-of-age story of a queer boy from a Czech industrial town, delving into the recesses of memory to come to terms with his painful childhood. Save 15%. bergstrompressbooks.com/en/fiction/1...

Los Angeles Regional Food Bank Our vision: No one goes hungry in Los Angeles.

If you're able to, please donate to this one if in LA, or to whichever your local one is.
www.lafoodbank.org?_gl=1%2Aft21...

Amazon is helping fund a $300 million build of a ballroom for the White House.

Independent bookstores are donating to food banks and organizations that help with food insecurity.

They are not the same.

Live in the DMV and have an interest in Central and Eastern European literature? Make sure you follow us or get on our mailing list. Last night we hosted Czech author Marek Torčik & Sunday we will host Ukrainian poet Iryna Vikyrchak. Copies of both books are available in the bookstore.

St. Petersburg Street Musician Jailed Again Over Viral Anti-Putin Performance - The Moscow Times A Russian court has sentenced 18-year-old street musician Diana Loginova to 13 days in jail for a second time this month over her viral performances of anti-Kremlin songs.

Diana Loginova, 18, was sentenced to 13 days in jail shortly after finishing a previous 13-day sentence for her band's performances of anti-war songs.

A brief detour from Chekhov scholarship (for class) and FSU writers' portrayals of the Holocaust and the war (for conference paper). Preface begins with discussion of Dostoevsky's near-execution.

❤️

Sending you good wishes.

A friendly reminder to vote if you're in California, should you need one. Come on, California, you can do this, yes, you can.

A woman sits in profile wearing a dark dress with white collars and white material at the sleeves. She has a swathe of rust-red material over her shoulder. Her hair is dark and pinned back with a short fringe. She is looking down and her profile is notable for its aquiline nose and large eyes.

This portrait of Akhmatova was painted by Olga Della-Vos-Kardovskaya in 1914. Come and hear Stephen Capus and I talk about Akhmatova at Ledbury Winter Poetry Festival on Sat 22 November: www.ticketsource.co.uk/whats-on/her...

Are you a furloughed federal worker? Need some kind of escape? Swing by the bookstore, we have a lot of ARCs we would happily give you. #strongertogether

Sofia Petrovna – Lydia Chukovskaya (tr. Aline Werth) I read Sofia Petrovna back in August for ‘WITMonth’, but I’m only now getting around to writing about it! An excellent, tragic novella, this book was recently published by the wonderful Persephone …

My new blog post on Lydia Chukovskaya's brilliant, chilling, tragic novella, SOFIA PETROVNA. Translated from the Russian by Aline Werth.
readersretreat2017.wordpress.com/2025/10/28/s...

Today, we remember the 11 innocent lives taken during the shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh.

We honor the victims and commit to building a country free from antisemitism and hatred.

A pinkish-orange magazine cover of Chicago Quarterly Review, volume 42, Fall 2025

The Richest Kid in the World By Olga Zilberbourg I was stuck at home for the second week in a row. I had what I always had, bronchitis. My breathing was back to normal, mostly, and I was so well rested that I started waking up at the crack of dawn to read before going back to sleep. When I woke up again, the apartment was quiet. My parents were at work; my brother, at school; my grandmother, out shopping. Only grandfather was home, peeling potatoes in the kitchen to the dull drone of the radio. It seemed like the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union was always presiding that year, and if it wasn’t the Supreme Soviet, it was the Congress of the People’s Deputies of the Soviet Union. I knew important things were happening in my country. Every week, I received a youth newspaper where I read about the mistakes of the Communist party and the country’s turn toward openness and democracy. I saved the most important bits for the school wall newspaper. But enough was enough. I didn’t understand how my grandparents could listen to those debates from morning to night. I wanted to do something. I had my books, my record player, my notebooks, my colored pencils and my collection of paper dolls, the view of the yard from my third-floor window and the maple tree that I considered my friend, the flurry of snowflakes that were entertaining to watch for a few minutes while listening to Tchaikovsky on my record player… I had my homework, for goodness’ sake. But no, no. My heart yearned for something else. A battlefield, a sailboat, a ballroom, a surprise phone call, a piece of chocolate candy, anything.

Huge thanks @elizabethmck.bsky.social and @chicagoqreview.bsky.social for publishing my personal essay "The Richest Kid in the World." It's about the fall of the USSR as told through the eyes of a pre-teen, censorship, & the way end of censorship in the USSR affected different generations.

It is other-wordly. Right in the middle of London, and you descend into the Roman world.

www.londonmithraeum.com
And the Roman amphitheater in the nearby Guildford Art Gallery.
Free admission to both.

Due to my not realizing that not all early vote centers open today, I couldn't go to my local one, so I went to the one that did open today in the area, located in a park that has been the hub for Soviet Jews since, well, Soviet times. Come on, California, you can do this, yes, yes, you can, yes.😉

Book, Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler, hardcover with jacket

What are you reading this weekend?

I’m working my way through this. Haven’t progressed far, but it is engaging.

We read it in high school. I remember nothing except thinking it was good. I should reread.

Yay!

Once our flight from Mexico got delayed back to the US because there was something majorly wrong with one of the plane's doors and for whatever reason, they had to call an engineer in Brazil to help out. I hope the system resets sooner than that.

The New Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary 12th Ed.

Technically, this is a book of spells.

British definitely not; are German trains not reliable (I'd stereotupically assume the opposite). Dutch trains were a wonder - if it's an 11 o'clock train, that's the time they pull out of the station already🤣

And now looking forward to the other book you recommended :)