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3.5 

Hard by a Great Forest

By Leo Vardiashvili
Hard by a Great Forest by Leo Vardiashvili digital book - Fable

Publisher Description

ONE OF NPR’s “BOOKS WE LOVE" 2024

NAMED ONE OF THE OBSERVER’S 10 BEST NEW NOVELISTS FOR 2024

"The stakes could barely be higher in Leo Vardiashvili’s propulsive page-turner…It’s a spellbinding achievement."—The Financial Times

“Has a commercial-fiction spring in its step.… Vardiashvili also has captured the winking, world-weary humor and magic-realist touches that mark a lot of literature from Europe’s war-torn corners.” Los Angeles Times


"This novel annihilated me.... Left my heart bruised and battered and aching for more." —Khaled Hosseini, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Kite Runner

“Tender and raw and funny.” —Colum McCann, National Book Award winning author of Let the Great World Spin

"Propulsive, funny, and profound."—Elif Batuman, Pulitzer Prize finalist and bestselling author of The Idiot

“A book like no other, from an imagination like no other.” —Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize winning author of Less Is Lost

Amid rubble and rebuilding in a former Soviet land, one family must rescue one another and put the past to rest: a stirring novel about what happens after the fighting is over

Saba is just a child when he flees the fighting in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia with his older brother, Sandro, and father, Irakli, for asylum in England. Two decades later, all three men are struggling to make peace with the past, haunted by the places and people they left behind.

When Irakli decides to return to Georgia, pulled back by memories of a lost wife and a decaying but still beautiful homeland, Saba and Sandro wait eagerly for news. But within weeks of his arrival, Irakli disappears, and the final message they receive from him causes a mystery to unfold before them: “I left a trail I can’t erase. Do not follow it.”

In a journey that will lead him to the very heart of a conflict that has marred generations and fractured his own family, Saba must retrace his father’s footsteps to discover what remains of their homeland and its people. By turns savage and tender, compassionate and harrowing, Hard by a Great Forest is a powerful and ultimately hopeful novel about the individual and collective trauma of war, and the indomitable spirit of a people determined not only to survive, but to remember those who did not.

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166 Reviews

3.5
Anxious Face with sweat“I really enjoyed this book, despite it being pretty dark and not giving me the ending I wanted. I loved the intimate look at Georgian culture and landscape, including how their culture and mentality has been shaped by constant war and invasion. Georgia is a very unique place with unique people and I think this book was a great representation of that.”
Thumbs Up“While I didn’t expect a story about war to be overly happy, I wished for a better resolution for the characters that I had grown fond of and carried the story. Mystical elements were a hit and miss, but sometimes perfectly placed.”
“I need someone I know to read this, so I can discuss! I was invested from the get go; the mix of the history of a country I know little about and fairytale elements was unique. I haven’t read anything like it. I found myself googling Georgia’s history & pictures of different places, like Tbilisi & Ushguli. I also loooooved the relationship between the main character, Saba, and his brother, Sandro. “Ever been struck by lightning, my friend?’ he’d say if you met him back then. Crazy Eastern European, you’d think- a fever glint in his eyes and an odd accent you couldn’t place. ‘There’s more chance of being struck by lightning than meeting a Georgian outside of Georgia.” “As we entered the city of Tbilisi, I began to recognize things - a crumbling street corner, or a building, or a peculiar twist of the road. At the same time, I didn’t recognize a damn thing. The way your teeth feel after the dentist leaves you with unfamiliar edges to snag your tongue on. Tbilisi’s a city that was invaded, leveled, and rebuilt more than thirty times. Over the centuries, all manner of empires and their unhinged rulers had their way with the city- the Ottomans, the Byzantines, the Russians. As a result, Tbilisi architecture is schizophrenic.” “Our language holds, Sandro. Even now, years after we set it aside in favor of inattentive emails and belated birthday text messages. It still holds, brother.””

About Leo Vardiashvili

Leo Vardiashvili was born and raised in Tbilisi, Georgia. When he was twelve, he and his family fled Georgia’s post-Soviet regime for asylum in England. He studied English literature at Queen Mary University of London.

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