*****Love Like Water, Love Like Fire by Mikhail Iossel

 LibraryThing Early Review

Memory either confirms or refutes the very fact of our own existence.

 

Iossel portrays an often absurd and haunting life under Stalin’s rule. Having grown up as a Russian Jew in the Soviet Union, he pulls from his own life experience in this fictionalized autobiography. Ioseel uses the short story form to offer glimpses into various aspects of his life, but altogether it works as a novel.

 

I grew up during the United States Duck and Cover program when we greatly feared the Soviets. I had to laugh as an author of similar age was taught to fear and look down on what he believed would become Soviet America. Iossel seems to do this purposefully as a form of laugh-out-loud irony. Similarly, he illustrates the absurdities and fear of being a Soviet Jew. He does so magnificently with irony and sadness.

 

Iossel’s perspective is unique, somewhat funny and horrifying. If you liked Pamuk’s Museum of Innocence and the tension in Ravel’s Bolero (referring to Iossel’s short story, Moscow Windows), you will enjoy this novel as it is superbly written.