by Marian Fell
First published 2017
Vanya has spent years managing his brother-in-law's rural estate, believing he was supporting a great professor's important work. When the professor arrives with his beautiful young wife Yelena, Vanya's world crumbles. He realizes the professor is a mediocre scholar who has wasted Vanya's life and devotion. As desire and resentment simmer through the household, Vanya watches the doctor Astrov fall under Yelena's spell while his niece Sonya loves Astrov hopelessly. The tensions explode when the professor announces his plan to sell the estate, threatening to destroy the only home Vanya and Sonya have known. Vanya's rage boils over into a desperate act that changes nothing. When the visitors finally leave, Vanya and Sonya remain behind to face their quiet desperation and find meaning in work and endurance.
Genres: fiction, drama, literary-fiction, 20th-century, 19th-century
Vibes: emotional-atmospheric, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Russia, Rural Estate
Period: 19th-Century, 20th-Century
70 pages · Paperback · Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Content warnings: depression, mental-illness