A crime mystery with magical elements, set in 1919 Kyiv during a time of chaos, shifts of power and random violence, shot through with Kurkov’s sense of irony and the absurd
Andrey Kurkov
- Prizes judged
Born near Leningrad in 1961, Andrey Kurkov was a journalist, prison warder, cameraman and screenwriter before he became well-known as a novelist
After ‘hundreds of rejections’, Kurkov became a successful pioneer of self-publishing, selling more than 75,000 copies of his books in a single year. His novel Death and the Penguin, his first in English translation, became an international bestseller, translated into more than thirty languages.
As well as writing fiction for adults and children, Kurkov has become known as a commentator and journalist on Ukraine for the international media. His work of reportage, Ukraine Diaries: Dispatches from Kiev, was published in 2014, followed by the novel The Bickford Fuse (2016). He lives in Kiev with his British wife and their three children.
Andrey Kurkov was a judge for the International Booker Prize 2009. His novel Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv was longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2023.
The escapades of Andrey Kurkov’s loveable eccentrics provide a frame for an intriguing portrait of Lviv in the 2000s
The International Booker Prize 2023 panel of judges on 'Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv'
All nominated books
Inflected with Kurkov’s signature humour and magical realism, The Silver Bone crafts a propulsive narrative that bursts to life with rich historical detail
Shot through with Kurkov’s unique brand of black humour and vodka-fuelled magic realism, Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv is an affectionate portrait of one of the world’s most intriguing cities
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