I think that at least a basic knowledge of Ukraine’s troubled and turbulent history is necessary to really get to grips with this novel, as there is much that is assumed in the narrative. It’s the story of a multi-generational family living in the same apartment in Lviv – great-grandmother, grandmother, mother and daughter. In spite of their shared present each has been affected by historical events in different ways, and their complicated histories reflect Ukraine’s own complicated history. As the book opens, the mother, the star soprano of the Lviv opera, who is also a political activist, is shot dead whilst taking part in a protest against Soviet power. The story is narrated by the daughter who has to make sense of her mother’s death and her own life during the recent political upheavals in the area. As much a history of Ukraine as a history of one family, the novel gives an insight into the past and present reality of life in Ukraine, and I enjoyed that aspect very much, but overall I found it a difficult book to fully engage with.