First published 2017
Stepan Trofimovitch Verhovensky has spent years crafting his identity as a progressive patriot and persecuted exile in a sleepy Russian town. He relishes this role of the suffering intellectual, though his persecution exists more in his imagination than reality. The narrator, who respects but sees through Stepan's theatrical nature, prepares to tell the story of recent strange events that have shattered the town's peaceful obscurity. Stepan's fondness for playing the romantic outcast has elevated him to a position of local prominence, feeding his vanity while blinding him to his own self-deception. As the narrator begins to unfold these mysterious incidents, Stepan's carefully constructed persona stands at the center of coming upheaval. The story promises to reveal how a man who has lived so long in agreeable daydreams will fare when reality intrudes on his picturesque self-image.
Genres: fiction, 20th-century, 19th-century
Vibes: atmospheric, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: character-study, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Russia, Moscow
Period: 19th Century
644 pages · Paperback · CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
Content warnings: mental-illness