A Red Army Story

About the Book

The good soldier Svejk is back. This time on the other side of the Eastern Front after all the wars have ended, except the eternal struggle of man against himself and this most impossible of all possible worlds.

A Red Army Story is a satirical novel set during the last, chaotic years of the USSR. It follows Alex, a regular conscript, through his unexpectedly irregular adult life. When the National Alarmed Forces fail to become a home sweet home for Alex, he starts on a humorous quest for that mysterious Russian soul which leaves everyone mystified, including Russians themselves, and for that mysterious human soul which mystifies even gods.

How does a lad survive in a world created by real men for real men? Alex is everything a real man cannot be. He is a soldier of misfortune turning… into an angel of frivolous comeuppance against his own will.

There is much more to this book than its title suggests. You will find everything in its main plot and several by-stories: burlesque and grandulesque, comedy and tragedy, absurdity and eccentricity… This is a book that makes you laugh, and, while you laugh, it sets you thinking. It is a broad satire of the modern society’s lifestyles and mores, a rare combination of wit and observation. Truth about human nature has rarely been so insolently straightforward.

For more information about the book and for excerpts, please, visit the official homepage at redarmystory.googlepages.com

About the Author

This debut book is partly autobiographic, the author having been conscripted into the Soviet Army at the age of 18. Now aged 39, Alexander Mathew currently lives in Moscow, Russia, studying the elusive Russian character, its dark, light and funny sides, and dedicating himself to a writing career.