We look forward to seeing you at the French Institute on 16 September, when Olivier Norek will be in conversation with Andrey Kurkov.
We featured Andrey Kurkov’s Grey Bees at our first BookBlast book club discussion in April 2024.
Ukraine’s most celebrated novelist turns the brutal reality of war into a quietly devastating fable, through the adventures of a mild-mannered beekeeper, underpinned by the author’s trademark dark humour.
In the tiny village of Starhorodivka comprising three streets in Ukraine’s “Grey Zone” — that lawless strip between loyalist and separatist forces — only two residents remain: Sergey Sergeyich, a retired safety inspector turned apiarist, and Pashka, his irritable childhood rival turned wartime co-survivor. With no electricity, dwindling food and the constant threat of shelling, Sergeyich clings to one source of solace: his bees. As spring nears, he knows they must be moved beyond the frontlines if they’re to survive and to collect their pollen in peace. His modest mission brings him face-to-face with fighters and civilians on both sides of the battle lines: loyalist soldiers, separatists, Russian occupiers, displaced Crimean Tatars. Through it all, Sergeyich’s guileless decency and moral compass have a disarming effect. But in a world where innocence can be weaponised, even the purest intentions risk exploitation. Can one man’s moral clarity hold fast in a brutal war that obliterates humanity on every level?
Our Daily War will be the book in focus at the discussion with Olivier Norek on 16 September. It is the sequel to Kurkov’s first volume of war diaries, Diary of an Invasion which was selected by The Times as one of 2022’s 12 best biographies and memoirs. He was in conversation with Guardian journalist, Charlotte Higgins, at Edinburgh Festival in August, attended by nearly 500 people.
We are featuring Olivier Norek’s The Winter Warriors at our BookBlast book club discussion on 10 November 2025.
November 1939. A conscription officer reaches the quiet farming village of Rautjärvi. The Soviet Union has invaded, and for the first time since winning independence, Finland is at war. From this remote community, a handful of childhood friends march into the frozen wilderness to face the Red Army — uncertain if any will live to see home again. But among them is a secret weapon: Simo Häyhä, a young marksman whose deadly precision in the snow-shrouded forests will soon earn him the name ‘The White Death’.
Based on real figures and battles of the Finnish-Soviet Winter War, The Winter Warriors is a visceral, historical epic from one of Europe’s most celebrated crime novelists.
A recent article in The Guardian emphasises how topical, and important, the subject of this book is. The fence dividing Finland and Russia is no Berlin Wall, but it is now a key geopolitical faultline.
The Finnish minister of foreign affairs, Elina Valtonen, started her recent annual speech to all Finnish ambassadors around the world by mentioning Olivier Norek’s The Winter Warriors right at the beginning, and reiterating Finland’s support of Ukraine.
The Winter Warriors is already attracting a great deal of praise in advance of its publication by Open Borders Press on 15 September
“A novel you will not put down. Maybe never,” Richard Ford
“There are echoes of Vasily Grossman in this gripping, chillingly urgent story of the horrors and heroism of war,” A.D. Miller
“Olivier Norek’s astonishing novel on the Soviet invasion of Finland is gripping, horrifying, and surprisingly moving, perfect for fans of Ben Macintyre and Robert Harris,” Paula Hawkins
“A sniper’s life, a thriller of the highest quality, as timely as it is gripping, by a very fine writer,” Philippe Sands
“A fascinating and gripping novel about a forgotten corner of the Second World War. Remarkable and revelatory,” William Boyd
Join us at our book club to discuss The Winter Warriors at Hatchards, Piccadilly on 10 November 2025
Read BookBlast review Turf Wars book 2
The copyright to all the content of this site is held by the individual authors and creators. All rights reserved. Enquiries: please use the contact form
