I recently became a huge fan of Natasha Pulley after reading her debut, the Watchmaker of Filigree Street, earlier this year. I absolutely adore her writing, it always pulls you in and the way she explores the human heart will always pull at my heartstrings, so when I saw The Half Life of Valery K on Netgalley I knew I had to request it!

Valery K is about the titular character Valery, a former nuclear specialist who is currently a gulag prisoner. He has formed a way of coping with his life when he is suddenly uprooted and taken to City 40, where is expected to study the effect of radiation on animals. But it's not long because questions arise and he has to try and uncover the secrets that are being kept from him.

This is another power house of a novel. It hits you right in the heart and you'll find yourself sympathising with Valery right from the start. Pulley's research was impeccable as always. I actually didn't know much about the subject matter and it was fascinating to read about, whilst also being horrifying. I am a conflicted in my rating of this one however. Pulley's amazing writing is still there, the romance is lovely but I just could not get my head around the couple being a gulag prisoner and a KGB agent. Although Shenkov is written to be this upstanding citizen, he saves orphans, helps prisoners avoid harsh punishments - he's still a KGB agent and that fact really put me off him initially and it took me a while to warm up.

And now onto my main complaint: it's becoming a pattern in Pulley's books that the main female characters are always treated poorly. Their only place in the story is to act as an obstacle to the main couple and they always end up shafted out the picture in some form. In this one we have Shenkov's wife, and the head researcher, and neither of them have a satisfactory ending.

Whilst this one wasn't the new favourite I thought it would be, I still enjoyed reading it and I'll definitely be looking forward to Pulley's future works.

Many thanks to the Publishers and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was looking forward to reading this book and hence very happy when I was approved for an ARC. Now that I have finished, I just don’t know how to review and rate the book.

Well, I should preface this review with some information. I really like Pulley’s style of writing, her books manage to draw me in every time, despite knowing that there’s certainly going to be at least one female character that is supposed to be the bad guy (or better gal) who is sabotaging the M/M romance. Further, I have lived behind the Iron Curtain and, although that doesn’t make me an expert in Soviet culture, I wish this book had had at least one sensitivity reader, because the anachronisms and cultural/language missteps were jarring and jarringly obvious to me. Last but not least, the book was listed under Sci-Fi, which is probably for its science content.

2.5/5 Stars

Full review - including spoilers - can be found on the blog: https://scepticalreading.com/2022/06/the-half-life-of-valery-k/

I think it would have been better if I had gone into this book knowing more about it as I felt for half the book I was playing catch-up in terms of context and themes.

For me, despite the heavy subject matter there seemed to be an incongruous light touch to the plot and characters. I think Valery seemed to be written with more than just trauma playing into his personality but also a difficulty to read people and emotions and therefore the comfort he finds from science and factual reality. But as things emerge from his perspective I found everything quite sterile and opaque which for me as a reader was frustrating and, most importantly, failed to communicate the tragic nature of what was going on effectively.

I could not believe in Shenkov and found him shadowy and full of contradictions. Maybe that was because we got to know him through his relationship with Valery and it was down to the reader to read between the lines and flesh out his subtleties but I just found it frustrating. I could not reconcile his role as KGB agent and his growing relationship with Valery and why he went from enforcing the secrecy to exposing conspiracy. I just felt like missed some parts of the journey - maybe I did.

As historical fiction telling a rarely told story this had a lot of potential, but for me it was just hard to grasp hold of and failed to engage me as much as I would have liked in its emotion, characters and storytelling.

This honest review is with thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the advanced digital copy.

The Half Life of Valery K was not on my list of most anticipated books of 2022, but it definitely would have been had I known it was getting published this year, because Natasha Pulley is one of my favourite authors. It’s 1963, and Valery has spent six years in the gulag when he is abruptly transferred to a secret facility called Chelyabinsk 40, where his scientific expertise is required to study an irradiated forest and the animal life within. However, Valery soon realises that something is wrong; the levels of radiation in the city are far above what has been officially reported. Struggling with the effects of his trauma, and having firmly believed that he was going to die in the gulag, Valery is aware that he sees everything off-kilter. He’s almost moved through his own death to a state beyond it where nothing matters to him more than preserving the lives of others. He’s a hugely compelling protagonist, perhaps Pulley’s best creation to date, because of this skewed logic.

In this context, the title of the novel becomes fascinating: on first glance, we might assume that Valery’s ‘half life’ refers to how he has been damaged and reduced by the gulag. But there’s a second meaning here, tied more closely to the subject-matter of the novel: the ‘half life’ of a radioactive substance is how long it takes for half of the unstable nuclei to decay. Substances with a longer half life have a slower but longer reach across time, while substances with a shorter half life show their effects more quickly but don’t last as long. Pulley seems to be asking: what is someone like Valery’s impact on the world, and how long will it linger?

Pulley’s other novels have all been set in versions of the nineteenth century where the real and the speculative intermingle; for fans of her other books, reading The Half Life of Valery K is a rather disconcerting experience, because it’s all based on fact but feels profoundly unreal. The novel I kept thinking of while reading Valery K was Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed. There’s something about Valery that reminded me strongly of Shevek, the physicist protagonist of The Dispossessed who comes to a capitalist world from an anarcho-syndicalist society. Pulley doesn’t delve as deeply into alternative value-systems, but Valery’s thought processes are at odds with Soviet Russian norms; she also shows how her characters, raised under communism, are perplexed by the West, especially its treatment of women. Other Pulley tropes are present and correct – Valery is drawn into a close friendship with KGB head of security, Shenkov, despite the fact that he knows Shenkov could execute him at any time – but didn’t seem as central to this novel as they have been to her others. It’s Valery and his pet octopus who take centre stage.

In my opinion, Valery K ranks up there with Pulley's best books - The Bedlam Stacks and The Lost Future of Pepperharrow - while hopefully drawing in a new audience as well. 4.5 stars.

I enjoyed the first few chapters of this and was really keen to get further into it however, it’s a DNF at 38% for me. I’ve been reading this for over two weeks and I just haven’t been inclined to get any further with it. The idea and premise sounded interesting to me, but I just found the book too slow and I’ve decided to stop before I get into a reading slump. As I haven’t finished it, I won’t be publishing my opinions elsewhere. Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

"I know the value of the data. But those people have a right to try and live, at least, they --"
"A right?" she said, incredulous. "Christ, that's the most American thing I've heard anyone say in years. Rights are not biological law, you of all people should know that. They are a luxury, granted in times of peace and plenty." [loc. 1905]
It's 1963, and Valery Kolkhanov, formerly an esteemed physicist, has been a prisoner in a Siberian gulag for six years. Abruptly, he's told that he's being moved: he'll be working out the rest of his sentence as a prisoner-scientist at the Lighthouse, seventeen hundred kilometres from Moscow, where his old university lecturer Elena Resovskaya is leading research into the effect of radiation on the local ecology. It's all quite safe, Moscow -- in the person of KGB operative Shenkov -- assures Valery. But Valery is not convinced.

The Half-Life of Valery K is quite a departure from Pulley's earlier novels, in that there is nothing of the supernatural or mystical here. Instead, Pulley's latest novel is based on historical events in the USSR in the 1950s and 1960s. There are some familiar themes: people turned monstrous by circumstance; queer romance; a delightful octopus (this one is named Albert); the importance of kindness; the contrast between appearance and actuality.

Valery, whose narrative forms most of the novel, is an intriguing protagonist, a brilliant scientist with a stoic acceptance of life's unpredictability. He loves children and animals (in the gulag he has a pet rat named Boris) but is convinced he'll never have children of his own, that family life is 'not for him'. He cultivates a sunny disposition and a boyish appearance, both of which reduce the likelihood of confrontation. And, very early in the novel, it's revealed that he has prison tattoos which alarm new inmates.

Shenkov, the KGB Head of Security, is glacially smooth, softly spoken, handsome and well-groomed. Valery is initially terrified of Shenkov, expecting brutality and trickery: but Shenkov, it turns out, is a good man trying to make the best of an appalling career. He tries to keep orphaned children together, arranges adoptions, offers chocolate. He is also in charge of ensuring that no news about the Lighthouse gets out into the wider world, and his techniques are just about what you would expect for the Cold War USSR.

Shenkov, incidentally, is a family man: he's married to a redoubtable physicist, Anna, who I think might be Pulley's most sympathetic female character to date. There's a trio of extraordinary women at the heart of this novel: Anna, Elena Resovskaya with her sparkly red shoes, and Nanya the retired engineer. And behind those women are the ghosts of others, their appalling story only gradually revealed.

The focus of the plot is Valery's investigation of the irradiated landscape, and his growing conviction that he hasn't been told the whole truth about the 'radiation ecology' study. Valery, as a student, worked with Josef Mengele in Berlin in the 1930s: he knows about human trials, and he understands the importance of scientific data and the necessity of research. Despite that background, he isn't comfortable with what he discovers about the projects running at the Lighthouse: and his ethics aren't quite like anyone else's.

On the whole, I found this an incredibly engaging read. I didn't feel that the epilogue (with its musings on gender roles, a theme throughout the novel but never quite as prominent as in the last chapter) was wholly necessary: it felt as though a lot of issues were being glossed over. I would have liked some closure, something more than 'he never found out', on one significant strand of the story. And there are a couple of minor errors with historical detail: cassette recorders, BBC broadcasts from Parliament...

This is definitely a novel that gained depth on the second reading, simply because of how the story is paced, and how the characters and their relationships evolved. And it's full of the observed minutae that characterises Pulley's work: a glance, a gesture, a teacup, a scarf. Also very educational, not only about Soviet physics in the 1950s and 1960s but also about forest glass, bananas, gulag economics. Highly recommended.

Review copy provided by Netgalley. UK Publication Date 23rd June 2022.

Clever and moving, and somehow still showcasing Pulley's characteristic wit and humour despite the subject matter, 'The Half Life of Valery K' is my favourite read of the year so far.

It is no surprise to readers of this blog that I have loved Pulley’s writing since first picking up The Watchmaker of Filigree Street some years ago. There is a tenderness, a gentility, a kindness and warmth to her characters and her plotting which is genuinely heart warming. They are novels which charm.

So, the set up is that Valery K is a scientist working in a variety of fields, primarily biology and radiation, who begins the novel in a Siberian Gulag because twenty years earlier he had worked in Berlin with Josef Mengele – the issue for the Soviet state was not the interaction with the eugenicist Angel of Death but with decadent capitalism. We spend little time in the Gulag because within the opening pages Valery is whisked away to the mysterious Chelyabinsk 40.

His status is ambiguous: he is still a “zek”, a political prisoner serving his term and under constant threat of arrest, torture and return to the gulag; he is also a scientist with genuine respect being offered to him for his skills and knowledge. It is perhaps because of that ambiguity that the relationship between Valery and Shenkov – the prisoner and the KGB Officer who is willing to shoot Valery’s co-scientists and burn down the house of a journalist – just about becomes credible.

Shenkov is the weak link, if I am honest. Valery’s depiction is a credible and relatively convincing victim of oppression and brutality and his feat and paranoia are palpable. Shenkov, as a member of the KGB is complicit if not directly responsible for the brutality of the Soviet regime, the brutality that nearly broke Valery. The relationship between them, on which Pulley hangs the heart of the novel, feels much more uncomfortable that her other relationships. The only way that she manages to avoid the feeling that this is some manifestation of some form of Stockholm Syndrome is to make Shenkov unfeasibly good, saving orphans, completing orders as humanely as possible to avoid others completing them more brutally… perhaps too good to be true or credible.

The basic plot is embedded in real history – it must be real, there’s a wikipedia page dedicated to Chelyabinsk 40 – and centres around a study into the effect of massive nuclear contamination to wildlife. Vast and deliberate misinformation about the levels of contamination in this the alleged most polluted place on the planet, were rife. And, in Pulley’s invented addition, Valery discovers that there are also unethical human trials involving unwilling kidnapped subjects. Suspect governments and shady organisations could have been added to the bingo card at the beginning of this review!

As Valery uncovers a hidden village, whose inhabitants show extreme mutation, he shares his concerns with Shenkov and they uncover the truth. Valery, perhaps, has invested more research into the science than the sociology with this novel – or, at least, I felt that I had learned more of the science and found that the depiction of the KGB was at odds with and in conflict with what I feel I know about the Soviet Union already. Alongside this, Valery and Shenkov become more and more intimate, then misunderstand each other, then reconnect again – a cycle which occurs more than once.

The fantastical elements from previous novels is missing here, although perhaps the science takes its place, and time travel is limited to narrative flashbacks to reveal Valery’s past and both how he came to be in the Gulag and how he survived it. As always with Pulley, the balance between the present and the flashbacks was well judged and natural.

My biggest issue was the conclusion – so minor spoilers occur below. Shenkov has a wife, Anna, and children and he appears to be wholly dedicated to the children especially when he discovers that one has leukemia. As Valery recognises, his hold on Shenkov can only be secondary to his family’s hold on his affection, his love and his loyalty. And yet, in the finale as both Valery and Shenkov seek to defect to the West and Britain, his blase response to his family being left behind in a deeply polluted radioactive environment – and presumably in a deeply vulnerable condition as family of a defector – jarred massively. At the time, he was unconscious and unable to challenge or to complain, but later they seem to be dismissed in a single line. And that single line is more than Valery’s octopus gets!

And there is a very bizarre moment when addressed as “Mister” rather than as “comrade” and he rails about the oddness of the gendering of the word as if calling him “Penis” –

We would never all anyone Penis Harrison; how’s mister any different?

Whilst this may be a question raised about gender and hints that Valery views himself as transgender, there was no other suggestion before or after his defection that raised this.

In all, whilst I did enjoy the charm and the writing here, as I always have with Pulley, I found the novel much more problematic and less polished than any of her others.


What I Liked
The science of radiation and how differently different aspects are measured.
The tenderness and charm of the relationship between Shenkov and Valery.
The management of the flashbacks and structure of the novel.
Albert the octopus!

What Could Have Been Different
The depiction of life in the Soviet Union could have been more credible.
Shenkov’s characterisation could have been more credible.
Anna and the children and Albert’s fate could have been made clear – and the characters could have cared more about them.

I had never heard of the Kyshtym disaster, (the second worst nuclear incident in term of radiation released after Chernobyl) until I read this book. I found it both completely fascinating and terrifying.

Valery Kolkhanov, a biochemist, is halfway through a sentence in one of the gulags, when he is sent to City 40, to investigate the effects of radiation on plants and animals. None of his findings make sense, and he is silenced when he tries to investigate further. He becomes friends with a KGB officer, and over time it becomes obvious that something is being covered up.

The book works on two levels: first Valery’s investigations and the revelation of the cover-up, and second, the relationships between the characters. Other reviewers have referred to the book as a novel of relationships with the nuclear disaster as background. For me, it was the other way round: the aftermath of the disaster was far more important than the individuals.

In an afterword Natasha Pulley explains the background to the story, sadly most of it isn’t fiction. For readers who want more detail, Serhii Plokhy’s excellent book “Atoms and Ashes” has a chapter on Kyshtym.

I found this a compelling read, in fact it scared the living daylights out of me! Perhaps this is because I vividly remember Chernobyl, or growing up during the Cold War, which seemed to periodically “heat up”. Whether this is the reason, or whether it’s because I like the way the author writes (I’ve read all her books) I highly recommend it.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

natasha pulley is an automatic read author for me at this stage, because regardless of the subject matter her books just draw me in and refuse to let me go. this is definitely not my 'usual' sort of read, and was the first of pulley's books that is more pure historical fiction than fiction with a few historical and fantasy elements.

admittedly i didn't enjoy this as much as <i>watchmaker</i>, but that is a very high bar and i think this one slots in above the kingdoms in my natasha pulley ranking. i've never read an author that so keenly conveys yearning in text - the physical sensations of it that mean you really feel it as you're reading. i enjoyed following valery and shenkov through this, though the premise of a gulag prisoner falling in love with a KGB agent is...... hm. though you can tell research had been done for this, it is still hard to separate out the 'fictional' from the real (a choice to include dr mengele in this and expect us to still sympathise with the characters who helped to participate in his 'experiments').

i also know that many reviewers have said this but i am slightly tired of the 'women in the way' trope. in this one it is anna, shenkov's wife, and their family - who are shunted from the plot at the last minute for no real discernable reason???? i really liked anna and was hoping for more, and was disappointed to see she really was just left behind. i also thought it was a bit weird of shenkov to not put up more of a fuss about it in the last chapter - i know he had been in recovery for a while, but given his fervor to help save his daughter and the knowledge she didn't have long left to live, i struggled to make sense of him not even offering a token protest.

all that being said, i absolutely adore natasha pulley's writing and will gladly read anything she releases. her stories keep you coming back for more, even with premises as bleak as this one arguably is! i truly believe she is one of, if not the, best at writing character studies and gentle, tentative romances in the midst of any number of situations and circumstances. i will always pick up her work!

Natasha Pulley has a way of drawing you in without saying much at all - everything is told by the subtle gestures of her characters and the spaces between the lines where things are left unsaid. She's a master at writing novels about yearning, and Shenkov and Valery were interesting characters to follow, but ultimately their relationship felt very lukewarm and (once again) they had to work their story around "women in the way".

I had hope for Anna, seeing that she seemed to have more substance that the average female character to be found in Pulley's work (she was work-focused, clever and methodical, but still saw the practicality of being married and having children, making allowances in her life for these things, and cared about her family when they were in danger) but (spoiler?) she's basically forgotten about in the last 30 pages. The whole ending scene in the UK felt very odd and went against the essence of most of the characters, but especially Shenkov. You cannot convince me he would have left his family behind. It felt unfinished, but I do appreciate that real life is like that for many people who are forced to flee their home.

Other inconsistences and strange moments that brought me out of the flow included: the phrase "mate", the weird comparison of 'Mister' with penis, and also the suggestion that the words Navel/Nuclear could be confused, which would makes no sense in Russian.

However, despite all this I enjoyed reading and there's absolutely no denying that Pulley is a remarkable writer. She's very good at what she does.

I am an admirer of Natasha Pulleys books but thought ,as it was not her usual genre, this might not be as well executed. WRONG, this was great and her talent shines through every page. This tale (although based on some truth) is historical and set in the USSR. It is believable and the main characters relatable.

Natasha Pulley is one of those writers who never seems to put a foot wrong. This is her fifth novel, and the first that has not had fantasy elements. It's more of a historical novel, but with all the intrigue and wonderful characterisation that has made her a favourite writer of mine.

The title character is a biochemist in the USSR. At the novel's start he is halfway through a ten year sentence in the gulag, for the crime of having studied (legally at the time) abroad. He is unexpectedly moved to a top secret nuclear facility in the middle of nowhere, to serve out the rest of his time researching the impact of radiation on living creatures. His newfound relative freedom seems too good to be true after the miseries of the labour camp, even if every room is bugged and the KGB watch over everything they do. But very quickly he begins to realise all is not as it seems. Valery becomes increasingly certain that all the inhabitants of the city are in terrible danger, but will he be able to find anyone who believes him and is willing to risk their life to point it out to Moscow?

Valery is an excellent protagonist - very likeable, and gradually loveable as you get to know him. He is a deep, well rounded character that continues to surprise you throughout the story as more is revealed about his past. I cared deeply about him and was therefore very invested in the story. I also liked the supporting characters, who were also well drawn and interesting although small in number. And there's an octopus in it - what more can I say?

The plot is exciting and interesting. Elements of it are based on truth, as the author explains in her afterword, although the story itself is fiction - but plausible fiction. The craziest thing about the whole story is the way the USSR worked - the paranoia, the refusal to listen to sense, the denouncements and random arrests - and all of that is true. Elements are a bit upsetting - nothing hugely graphic, but there are descriptions of radiation sickness and of some of the horrible things that happen in oppressive regimes.

Perhaps the best element of the book is the central love story - and I'm someone who has very little patience for romance in books or real life. But if everyone wrote love stories like Natasha Pulley does, I'd happily read nothing but romance. She has a way of making you care so much about the characters involved that you hurt with them, and hope with them, and feel like you've experienced the whole journey yourself personally. She allows her relationships to develop and grow in a natural way, there's nothing formulaic or cliched about it. Very few authors can tap into my well buried inner romantic, but she is one of them.

I'd highly recommend this story to anyone who enjoys reading general fiction - there's something for everyone here. If you enjoyed her fantasy books, even though this one isn't a fantasy her writing style and ability to tell a good story are the same and I think would be enjoyable too. It's a must read for anyone interested in the USSR or in books about scientists. But mostly it's just a really good read that I think anyone would enjoy and be able to identify with elements of.

Valery is a worker in the gulag in Siberia when he is unexpected taken to City40, a mysterious city which is surrounded by nuclear reactors and full of suspicious rules which do not match the low readings they are presented with. He forms a friendship with a KGB officer and they investigate some mysterious geological and human happenings. There is a lot of science in this which seems very well researched (although I could be very easily fooled). As usual for Natasha Pulley, the characters are so real and I felt such sympathy for Valery and his low expectations. St the end of the book are some historical notes which show the hard to believe parts of the book are actually true. I did miss the magical part that is normally present in her books but this is still an excellent read. Thanks to Netgalley for an ARC. 4.5 stars rounded down.

Another splendid, emotionally charged book from Natasha pulley. This one is set in Russia in 1963 and features a scientist, Valery Kolkhanov working on radio-active organic material. Recently transferred from a gulag, Valery starts to discover anomalies in the information the people working at the plant have been given.
As usual, Natasha Pulley has created a wonderful main character. He is fragile but mentally strong. Poignantly drawn, he exudes an appealing charm.
The story is bleak but thrilling. The beautifully written prose keeps you wanting to read more and more. The book has been well-researched and I was fascinated by the details of the science incorporated into the story.
Highly recommended.

Not my normal ‘go to’ kind of book. But I was willing to give it a go based on very positive recommendations. I have not read any of Natasha Pulley’s other work to date so decided that if I enjoyed reading this book, I would definitely seek her other work out.

From page one onwards, of The Half Life of Valery K, I was gripped. A fascinating story revealed: Valery K is a scientist sent to the gulag for 6 yrs, then assigned to an area of Siberia to test radiation and its affects on plants and animals in the surrounding area of a town.
He is all questioning of his environment (after leaving the prison), the dead forest, the odd crackling within the electrics and especially the people in charge; those assigned to the role with him and those being lied to - which was pretty much everyone.
It was hard for him to disseminate the truth but the only truth he could rely on, was his science and that people were being lied to. Not that anyone believed him when he tried to explain the radiation levels in the area; he got silenced for just trying. Until he meets Shenkov, who he confides in. And then there are others, though too afraid to speak out.

There is a sense of lightheartedness about the dialogue between the characters that suggests irony of the situation and the frustration being felt by Valery; a shrouded lie where everyone believes things are normal, so are acting normally.

Valery is a strong well crafted main character who is the prime witness to the after affects of a recent event. I love Pulley’s ability to insert little nuggets of supposedly random prose that gets you questioning what is really going on, from the viewpoint of Valery.
Her scenes were descriptive enough that I could picture what Valery was witnessing but not enough to understand what was actually happening, or at least not at first, not until Valery starts to build a better picture for himself. We are then introduced to shocking and harrowing affects of radiation poisoning.

I wont give anything else away in this review. All in all, a fascinating and insightful story and I look forward to reading Natasha Pulley’s other work.

When we meet Valero K he is at the beginning of his recovery from imprisonment in a Soviet ‘gulag’ and has been sent to a community in the remotest part of the country to continue his work as a nuclear research scientist. What he finds there could change the lives of not just the people working and living there, but the course of the whole nuclear power struggle in the world. The story is complex but the writing always makes it easy for the reader to follow. There is drama and skullduggery in abundance and the reader becomes completely invested in saving the scientists and the people around them from nuclear Armageddon. It’s a difficult book to review without giving the plot away, but this is well worth reading, although the science does occasionally become a little overwhelming.

I’ve loved Natasha Pulley’s books ever since a friend introduced me to the wonderful Watchmaker of Filigree Street last year, so I’ve been very excited about the release of her new novel. Enormous thanks, therefore, to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance copy.

The Half Life of Valery K is a slightly different direction from her previous books, but what it lacks in magical realism it makes up for in a fascinating, based-on-real-events story of a never-admitted radiation leak in Russia in the 1950s.

It’s recognisably a Pulley novel, with gentle, brave characters, a tentative almost-romance, and enough of a mystery and tension to keep you reading. Perhaps not my favourite of her books, but a thoroughly enjoyable read.

This is the first book I've read by Natasha Pulley, it definitely won't be the last. This book drew me in from the start and will stay with me. I found it heartbreaking, gutwrenching and yet heartwarming and hopeful. A wonderful novel and a must read.

I could just gush and gush and gush about ‘The Half Life of Valery K’, because I am an absolute devotee of Natasha Pulley and this book does everything that you expect from a classic Pulley novel: perfectly pitched diction and dialogue, and a considered tone that assumes suspension of disbelief and veers just this side of magical realism (there is no crossing over into actual fantasy here, which has typically been a feature of Pulley’s other work).

I find Pulley’s usual compelling style here; elements of high pathos that have been employed in previous novels serve to heighten our sense of the characters’ lovesickness, their unspoken, cloaked romantic feelings for one another, as has often been the way with Pulley’s two male protagonists.

Pulley’s clarity is, as always, razor-sharp, and makes for an easy read – not by any means facile, but rather, I mean a read that you can fall for and let consume you totally. Here, her plot is as cohesive and as consistent as, say ‘The Bedlam Stacks’; it’s full of surprises, which often catch you off-guard. Then, when your disbelief at the revelation settles, each plot point – like a breadcrumb trail – betrays itself as having been priming you for the next one and, indeed, the final scene.

I think the final episode is necessary in every way - though it seems so incongruous – because Pulley does need to throw the East into contrast through juxtaposition to the West. Whether added in the final drafts given the context of the atrocities Russia is committing in Ukraine, or whether the novel was always written with such an ending, by doing so, Pulley raises questions over whether KGB or Russian nuclear scientists should be represented as sympathetic and what British culture looks like when it is held up against Stalinism. With this novel, Pulley succeeds in establishing a space for discourse of contemporary conflict and warfare.

At heart, this is a character study, and a romance. Yet those elements are intrinsically linked to the novel’s setting. And in 2022, that asks readers to be cognisant of current hostilities in Eastern Europe and North Asia, but also sensitive to the 1950s/60s historical framing of the narrative, which carries a different ethical rhetoric. We should not suspend our modern intellect and feelings, but I think Pulley asks that the reader hold both in our minds as we read ‘The Half Life of Valery K’ in 2022.

Ultimately, how can I summarise my enjoyment of the novel, except to say that this is my die-happy-now moment? Even if I never ever get another Netgalley ARC approved, my life as a reader is complete and the privilege of reading an early copy of Natasha Pulley’s latest book has been priceless. My deep gratitude is due to Bloomsbury Publishing Plc for providing me with an advanced digital copy in exchange for my honest opinion.