IN THE HERE AND THERE

Narbikova’s equally daunting companion novel to Day and Night (Dec. 1998): here, she “dramatizes” Russia’s experience of perestroika in the 1980s through accounts of protagonist Petia’s affairs with three lovers who are, in surreal fashion, identified with eminent figures from Russian literature and history (including Dostoevsky’s Raskolnikov, social philosopher Alexander Herzen, the ubiquitous Pushkin, Joseph Stalin, and perhaps Mikhail Gorbachev). It’s an amusing idea, and the story has its moments, but it won’t mean much to readers who aren—t thoroughly versed in Slavic studies.