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Review
`Kurkov has been a Soviet military prison guard and a Ukrainian journalist as well as a novelist, and behind the absurdist humour is a well-informed picture of a cowboy society where life is cheap and cash is king. Good-hearted and brutal at the same time, The Milkman in the Night is a complex, unsettling mixture of bleakness and warmth.' --The Sunday Times
Kate Saunders: `A glorious, epic, eccentric and often hilarious satire, heavily tinged with Russian melancholy.' --The Times
`This book is a joyride in which the joyless mix with the fearful, the crazy, the paranoid, not to mention some innocent jetsam... Kurkov has a rollercoaster of fun between zig and zag. He defies the reader not to join him.' --The Scotsman
`Kurkov's imagination kicks into high gear and turns Kiev into an absurdist playground. The result is a whimsical, skewed vision which can be, by turns, delightful and discomforting.' --The Herald
`blacky surreal... Kurkov has an artisan's eye for quirky detail but dispatches it with terse Eastern pessimism. Here, he weaves a low-key epic in which a series of characters - a single mother, a sniffer-dog handler, a security guard, a politician, a man having an affair in his sleep, a widow, two cats and a plastinated corpse - become embroiled in a bizarre conspiracy involving a drug that sharpens people's sense of justice and a very dodgy milking operation. It sounds fanciful but Kurkov never gets too caught up in this world, describing it with a pragmatic economy and powerful clarity.' --Metro
`There is much to enjoy in this book. Kurkov works in the tradition of Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Bulgakov, blending folkloric characters, magical realism and political satire to reveal a society riddled with greed, stupidity and corruption.' --Financial Times
`Set in post-Orange Revolution Kiev, Kurkov's narrative is a meditation on the uneasy dreams of a troubled cultural psyche... The novel's imperfect dopplegangers and off-key repetitions warm the shiver of the traditional uncanny, and in doing so replicate the dreamer's affable toleration of obvious frauds... What lingers in Kurkov's depiction of a Kiev both somnolent and necropolitan, is the notion that Ukraine's recent past has been blighted by toxic wastefulness, the bad vigilance of espionage and surveillance.' --TLS
'Kurkov entices us along all the fault-lines of his bizarre world, where a young man sleepwalks through a double life and a widow notices her embalmed husband has fresh dirt on his unworn shoes.' --The Independent
`the separate storylines ... twine into a bizarre quasi-murder mystery, featuring anti-fear medicine, human milk used as youth serum, corpse embalming, a cat that comes back from the dead and shady government practices. Ukranian author Andrey Kurkov's direct, unfussy narration is drenched in post-soviet pessimism and alcohol ... readers trying to second-guess future twists will be astonished.' --Manchester Evening News
Kate Saunders: `A glorious, epic, eccentric and often hilarious satire, heavily tinged with Russian melancholy.' --The Times
`This book is a joyride in which the joyless mix with the fearful, the crazy, the paranoid, not to mention some innocent jetsam... Kurkov has a rollercoaster of fun between zig and zag. He defies the reader not to join him.' --The Scotsman
`Kurkov's imagination kicks into high gear and turns Kiev into an absurdist playground. The result is a whimsical, skewed vision which can be, by turns, delightful and discomforting.' --The Herald
`blacky surreal... Kurkov has an artisan's eye for quirky detail but dispatches it with terse Eastern pessimism. Here, he weaves a low-key epic in which a series of characters - a single mother, a sniffer-dog handler, a security guard, a politician, a man having an affair in his sleep, a widow, two cats and a plastinated corpse - become embroiled in a bizarre conspiracy involving a drug that sharpens people's sense of justice and a very dodgy milking operation. It sounds fanciful but Kurkov never gets too caught up in this world, describing it with a pragmatic economy and powerful clarity.' --Metro
`There is much to enjoy in this book. Kurkov works in the tradition of Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Bulgakov, blending folkloric characters, magical realism and political satire to reveal a society riddled with greed, stupidity and corruption.' --Financial Times
`Set in post-Orange Revolution Kiev, Kurkov's narrative is a meditation on the uneasy dreams of a troubled cultural psyche... The novel's imperfect dopplegangers and off-key repetitions warm the shiver of the traditional uncanny, and in doing so replicate the dreamer's affable toleration of obvious frauds... What lingers in Kurkov's depiction of a Kiev both somnolent and necropolitan, is the notion that Ukraine's recent past has been blighted by toxic wastefulness, the bad vigilance of espionage and surveillance.' --TLS
'Kurkov entices us along all the fault-lines of his bizarre world, where a young man sleepwalks through a double life and a widow notices her embalmed husband has fresh dirt on his unworn shoes.' --The Independent
`the separate storylines ... twine into a bizarre quasi-murder mystery, featuring anti-fear medicine, human milk used as youth serum, corpse embalming, a cat that comes back from the dead and shady government practices. Ukranian author Andrey Kurkov's direct, unfussy narration is drenched in post-soviet pessimism and alcohol ... readers trying to second-guess future twists will be astonished.' --Manchester Evening News
Book Description
A new masterpiece from the author of the cult classic Death and the Penguin.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Blurb writers do Andrey Kurkov no favours when they compare him with authors such as John Le Carre, Gogol and Dostoevsky, the latter two being invoked on the cover of this, Kurkov's latest novel to be translated into English. Kurkov is a much lighter read than any of those, shows no sign of expecting to be taken anything like so seriously, and is a lot more fun.
In the past, Bulgakov's name has also been placed alongside Kurkov's. That was pretty ambitious too, but in the case of The Milkman in the Night there are some realistic comparisons to be made. In common with Bulgakov in The Master And Margarita, Kurkov firmly roots surreal, absurdist events in actual streets, parks and other locations in and around a contemporary city. Kurkov's city is Kiev, Ukraine's capital and Kurkov's home. I know Kiev well. I read the novel with a streetmap to hand and never once faulted Kurkov on his geography. Perhaps surreal works best when given such a foundation.
Like Bulgakov, Kurkov satirises some genuine but nevertheless absurd political and other goings on by placing them in the space he has created between real and surreal. You may find it hard to believe that corruption and graft among Ukraine's ruling classes, police, security operatives, everyone with a service that they can sell, including priests, are really as bad as Kurkov describes. Tragically, they are. So is theft from baggage at the city's main international airport, and the degree to which superstition influences many people's lives.
But I begin to make the novel sound serious, which it is not. Kurkov has some entirely valid things to say about corruption, graft and superstition, but they are built into his story in such a way that they might scarcely be noticed by many readers. He has much affection for his characters, imperfect human beings as they all are. This is Ukraine today. For most people, life is far from easy, presenting many limitations and frustrations. Kurkov describes their lives with great care and much sympathy - people in Kiev and its outlying areas really do live like that.
So where does the surrealism come in? The jacket blurb hints at it and to tell more might spoil the story. I will mention, however, that another feature that echoes Master and Margarita is a cat that seems to have supernatural qualities. He is a modest fellow, though, doesn't stretch our credibility by speaking, and is selflessly benevolent.
As with many works translated from Russian, the uninitiated reader will struggle at times with names. Hardest of all is when Volodka (a Ukrainian pet name) suddenly becomes, just once, Vladimir (the Russian version of his given name). The `our Yulia', variously Yulechka, referred to is the former Prime Minister and Presidential candidate Yulia Timoshenko, but many readers might not guess. Nikochka will surprise as a pet name for Veronika, and so on. To know that pelmeni is similar to ravioli and that Soviet champagne is a real and much favoured beverage, even in our own time, may be helpful to some. And there are some loose ends in the story that are never tied up - one even wonders why some events are described at all. Kurkov seems to be aware of that problem, writing that his story is ongoing, with some aspects of it still not understood by himself. Is he suggesting there might be a sequel? To read about the next phase in the lives of some of his characters would be interesting, but the story as it stands is brought to a more or less satisfactory conclusion.
In the past, Bulgakov's name has also been placed alongside Kurkov's. That was pretty ambitious too, but in the case of The Milkman in the Night there are some realistic comparisons to be made. In common with Bulgakov in The Master And Margarita, Kurkov firmly roots surreal, absurdist events in actual streets, parks and other locations in and around a contemporary city. Kurkov's city is Kiev, Ukraine's capital and Kurkov's home. I know Kiev well. I read the novel with a streetmap to hand and never once faulted Kurkov on his geography. Perhaps surreal works best when given such a foundation.
Like Bulgakov, Kurkov satirises some genuine but nevertheless absurd political and other goings on by placing them in the space he has created between real and surreal. You may find it hard to believe that corruption and graft among Ukraine's ruling classes, police, security operatives, everyone with a service that they can sell, including priests, are really as bad as Kurkov describes. Tragically, they are. So is theft from baggage at the city's main international airport, and the degree to which superstition influences many people's lives.
But I begin to make the novel sound serious, which it is not. Kurkov has some entirely valid things to say about corruption, graft and superstition, but they are built into his story in such a way that they might scarcely be noticed by many readers. He has much affection for his characters, imperfect human beings as they all are. This is Ukraine today. For most people, life is far from easy, presenting many limitations and frustrations. Kurkov describes their lives with great care and much sympathy - people in Kiev and its outlying areas really do live like that.
So where does the surrealism come in? The jacket blurb hints at it and to tell more might spoil the story. I will mention, however, that another feature that echoes Master and Margarita is a cat that seems to have supernatural qualities. He is a modest fellow, though, doesn't stretch our credibility by speaking, and is selflessly benevolent.
As with many works translated from Russian, the uninitiated reader will struggle at times with names. Hardest of all is when Volodka (a Ukrainian pet name) suddenly becomes, just once, Vladimir (the Russian version of his given name). The `our Yulia', variously Yulechka, referred to is the former Prime Minister and Presidential candidate Yulia Timoshenko, but many readers might not guess. Nikochka will surprise as a pet name for Veronika, and so on. To know that pelmeni is similar to ravioli and that Soviet champagne is a real and much favoured beverage, even in our own time, may be helpful to some. And there are some loose ends in the story that are never tied up - one even wonders why some events are described at all. Kurkov seems to be aware of that problem, writing that his story is ongoing, with some aspects of it still not understood by himself. Is he suggesting there might be a sequel? To read about the next phase in the lives of some of his characters would be interesting, but the story as it stands is brought to a more or less satisfactory conclusion.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Milkman in the Night is...er...ok. It's a tale set in and around Kiev, and follows the fortunes of a wet nurse, a deputy in Parliament and his security guard, and a member of airport security at Kiev airport. The airport security guard steals a suitcase full of some form of contraband, and this contraband causes all sorts of crazy things to happen in Kiev. Dead cats come back to life and prowl the streets seeking out and punishing injustice. A man sleepwalks in the middle of the night, meeting a strange lady who is not his wife, but is unable to remember it in the morning. And so on.
All this sounds brilliant, and evokes the magical realism of, say, The Master And Margarita (Penguin Classics). But this, for me, is exactly the problem. Kurkov's novel feels like a faint shadow of Bulgakov's. Where Bulgakov uses brilliant comedy and ludicrous farce to create a piercing critique of Russian politics, Kurkov's novel just seems mildly amusing, a little non-sensical and occasionally touches on the corruption of Ukrainian politics in a light-hearted way. In other words, it seems a pale imitation.
I wonder if perhaps I am missing something about this novel? If I am, I'd love to know!
All this sounds brilliant, and evokes the magical realism of, say, The Master And Margarita (Penguin Classics). But this, for me, is exactly the problem. Kurkov's novel feels like a faint shadow of Bulgakov's. Where Bulgakov uses brilliant comedy and ludicrous farce to create a piercing critique of Russian politics, Kurkov's novel just seems mildly amusing, a little non-sensical and occasionally touches on the corruption of Ukrainian politics in a light-hearted way. In other words, it seems a pale imitation.
I wonder if perhaps I am missing something about this novel? If I am, I'd love to know!
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Knowing Kurkov to be a unique writer with a flair for quirkiness, I was looking forward to reviewing the Milkman in the Night. I had, some years previous, read Death And The Penguin (Panther) and seeing the length of "Milkman" by comparison, was intrigued as to how Kurkov's writing style translated in to a longer tome.
In short, I found this hard slog. Whilst the style is still familiar, and the new translator (I believe this translator has not worked on any of Kurkov's works before) has still done a fantastic job in the linguistic transition, I just couldn't get myself in to this.
I am not sure whether it was the pace of the novel, or the fact that my only other experience of Kurkov had indeed been a novel less than half the size (I think).
If you have kept up with his writing since Death and the Penguin, you will probably still love this, and my own opinion of the book doesn't detract from the fact that Kurkov is still a master in his field. But for something a bit leftfield and less of a slog on the synapses (if you have never read Kurkov before), I would recommend you go for 1Q84: Books 1 and 2.
In short, I found this hard slog. Whilst the style is still familiar, and the new translator (I believe this translator has not worked on any of Kurkov's works before) has still done a fantastic job in the linguistic transition, I just couldn't get myself in to this.
I am not sure whether it was the pace of the novel, or the fact that my only other experience of Kurkov had indeed been a novel less than half the size (I think).
If you have kept up with his writing since Death and the Penguin, you will probably still love this, and my own opinion of the book doesn't detract from the fact that Kurkov is still a master in his field. But for something a bit leftfield and less of a slog on the synapses (if you have never read Kurkov before), I would recommend you go for 1Q84: Books 1 and 2.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
The Milkman in the Night
I'm a big fan of Kurkov's earlier works, and this one has a lot of the magic but doesn't quite work as well as any of them. Read more
Published 10 days ago by David Brookes
Love it or hate it ... You decide!
Andrey Kurkov's latest book is an excellently translated tale of weird goings on set in Kiev, Ukraine. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Karen Baxter
The Milkman in the Night
This book was selected for our book club and initally I was looking forward to it particularly after reading other reviews. Read more
Published 5 months ago by snowcliff
Satisfying and Surreal
This is a tale of breast milk; cats; sleepwalking; mysterious medicines and plastination, set around Kiev in the Ukraine. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Martyn Davies
A Red Shift to a Parallel World
My rescue cat lives in a parallel world. The hairdryer and electric toothbrush are her enemies and she will strike them if they have the gall to face her. Read more
Published 7 months ago by D Webster
Amazing book
If you have read Kurkov before, you'll know what to expect, and you certainly won't be disappointed. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Laura Smith
No ordinary milkman
This is a translation from the Russian and the translator has done a great job I think . I can't speak Russian or Ukrainian, but the story flows . Read more
Published 8 months ago by Anthony Cattani
Reminded me of Haruki Murakami in the best possible way
I have never read any of Kurkov's work before although he has been recommended to me, and now I can see why. His prose is incisive, gripping and lucid. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Mrs. K. A. Wheatley
Good but not great
I expected a lot from this book - from the description as well as from the other reviewers' responses, but I've got to admit I've come away slightly disappointed. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Maria2222
Back in form!
I first fell in love with Andrey Kurkov's unique, whimsical, cynical style when I read Death And The Penguin (Panther) - which I would still recommend as the best introduction to... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Alexa
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