Als Tagtrumer hat es Viktor schwer in Kiew der Neureichen und der Mafia: ohne Geld und ohne Freundin lebt er mit dem Pinguin Mischa und schreibt unvollendete Romane fr die Schublade. Zum berleben verfat er fr eine groe Tageszeitung Nekrologe ber Berhmtheiten, die allerdings noch gar nicht gestorben sind. Wie jeder Autor mchte Viktor seine Texte auch verffentlicht sehen. Ein Wunsch, der bengstigend schnell in Erfllung geht.

When the corpse of a distinguished general and presidential adviser is found, attached to an advertising balloon, lieutenant Viktor Slutsky is sent in to investigate. Meanwhile, KGB officer Nik Tsensky arrives in Kiev for a secret mission.

"Kurkov is hugely talented. Truly very funny." --"Time Out"
Marital troubles?
Sick of life?
Suicide the answer?
Why not get yourself a contract killer?
Nothing easier, provided you communicate only by phone and box number. You give him your photograph, specify when and where to find you, then sit back and prepare to die.
Murdered, you will be of greater interest than ever you were in life. More to him than met the eye will be the judgment. A mysterious killing lives long in the popular memory.
Our hero meticulously plans his own demise, except for one detail: what...

Viktor - last seen in Death and the Penguin fleeing Mafia vengeance on an Antarctica-bound flight booked for Penguin Misha - seizes a heaven-sent opportunity to return to Kiev with a new identity. Clear now as to the enormity of abandoning Misha, then convalescent from a heart-transplant, Viktor determines to make amends. Viktor falls in with a Mafia boss who engages him to help in his election campaign, then introduces him to men who might further his search for Misha, said to be in a private zoo in Chechnya. What ensues is for Viktor both a quest and an odyssey of atonement, and, for the...

A major new novel from the author of "Death and the Penguin."
Moscow, January 2013. Bunin, the Ukrainian President, has joined other heads of state in an open air swimming pool, to celebrate the Fourth Centenary of the Romanov Dynasty. Treading water, and drinking vodka with Putin, he's on top of his game and in fine health. Yet two years later Bunin undergoes a heart transplant, with very serious repercussions... Rewind to the early '90s; the Soviet Union has crumbled and in the midst of a new independent Ukraine struggling to find its feet, a young Sergey Pavlovich Bunin is on the make....

A new masterpiece from the author of the cult classic "Death and the Penguin."
Semyon is disturbed. He has woken up in the living room with blood on his shirt, an angry wife and no idea where he was the night before. When this happens several mornings in a row, he realises he needs to investigate. After his friend Volodka follows him one night, they discover he's meeting a tall, blonde woman and accompanying her to her apartment. In the daytime he doesn't know this woman or where her apartment is and, odder yet, someone is watching Volodka watching Semyon. Meanwhile, there are some strange...

Viktor, with only his pet penguin for company, composes obituaries for the local newspaper, even though their subjects cling to life. When he sees his work in print for the first time, his pride turns to terror. He and Misha are drawn into a trap from which there appears to be no escape."

When Igor accidentally travels back to 1957, he finds out that the past isn't as rosy as it seems. In fact it's positively dangerous.
Igor is confident his old Soviet policeman's uniform will be the best costume at the party. But he hasn't gone far before he realises something is wrong. The streets are unusually dark and empty, and the only person to emerge from the shadows runs away from him in terror.
After a perplexing conversation with the terrified man, who turns out to be a wine smuggler, and on recovering from the resulting hangover, Igor comes to an unbelievable...

Ukrainian dispatches from the heart of Kiev.
"-16 C, sunlight, silence. I drove the children to school, then went to see the revolution. I walked between the tents. Talked with revolutionaries. They were weary today. The air was thick with the smell of old campfires."
"Ukraine Diaries" is acclaimed writer Andrey Kurkov's first-hand account of the ongoing crisis in his country. From his flat in Kiev, just five hundred yards from Independence Square, Kurkov can smell the burning barricades and hear the sounds of grenades and gunshot.
Kurkov's diaries begin on the first day of the...

A satirical epic of the Soviet soul by the bestselling author of Death and the Penguin