This past week, I read The Autumn Ball: Scenes of City Life by Mati Unt, which took place in #Estonia.
This book was written in 1979 and appears to have been translated in 1985, and is a fun example of late-Soviet-era literature. According to my own searches online, the English translation, at least, appears to be out of print, so I was fortunate to have found a used copy.
This is not as much of a plot driven book as it is a dive into a set of characters that all live within a seemingly standard high-rise apartment building in Tallinn. The book bounces back and forth through the simple daily lives of these six residents: a poet; an architect; a barber; a man driven to excess; a middle-aged mom; and the teenaged son of the mom. With bits of humor and character development, we follow these people through their day-to-day ups and downs, and their slight interactions, until the story culminates in a significant incident in their neighborhood that impacts them all to varying degrees.
I really enjoyed this book, on multiple levels - the story was fun and engaging and gives us a peek into a time and place in recent history that is so different from what we are experiencing today, and yet, it is at the same time not so different. Unt has a talent for making this story very relatable, no matter our time or place.
I also was thrilled to have found the specific copy of the book that I have. It was printed on a shiny, thin paper that I enjoyed reading. After some searching online, it seems that paper, the print, and the small size and format of the book are typical of the Soviet era in that region, so it really gave me the full experience! Finally, as I was reading this book - in English - I came across hand-written notes here and there from a previous reader who must have been using this book to learn English. In our current days of disconnection from others, this really warmed my heart and made me feel so intimately connected to this prior reader, who, like me was living in a time of uncertainty, learning a new language - maybe living in a new land too.
I will never know, but it was fun to think about as I was reading this enjoyable book that I highly recommend (though it will be a little tougher for you to find than some of my previous recommendations - good luck!).
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