Absurdistan Paperback – 4 February 2008

Misha Vainberg, son of Boris Vainberg, is the 1,238th richest man in Russia. Educated in the US at Accidental College, and a former resident of New York City, he can’t re-enter the US from his home in St. Petersburg, because the State Department is perturbed about his dad murdering an Oklahoman businessman. Honestly, those Americans and their principles. In St. Petersburg, Misha’s dad is murdered. Witnessing Papa’s death and being unable to get back to the States to be with the girl he loves (a barely literate stripper who he’s is putting through college), Misha thesophisticate and melancholic becomes decidedly more melancholic. Besides, he’s too Americanized to live in Russia, where there isn’t even much rap music. So, Misha travels to Absurdistan, an oil-rich country on the Caspian that most Americans can’t even find on a map, and bribes a diplomat to get him Belgian citizenship. But then a war breaks out between two rival and nearly identical factions and poor rich Misha is trapped. He hides out in the Hyatt, surviving on buffalo-wings and Johnny Walker black label, but his money has limits (everything, Misha realizes, has limits). Perennially naïve and believing he’s much more charitable than he really is (he keeps claiming to be the head of a charity for children), the junior Vainberg gets caught up in Adbsurdi politics and that’s when things get truly, well, absurdi. Will he ever get out of this odd little country? Will he make it back to the land of liberty and the titty-bar girl he loves?That’s the plot: simple, but fleshed out by beautiful writing and boundless quirkiness and fun. I must say that I loved this novel. Gary Shteyngart has the literary flare of Martin Amis, the wonderful oddness of Kurt Vonnegut, and the eccentric Jewish humour of Mordecai Richler. Indeed, I’ve read few books as funny or well-written and don’t know how anyone could give it less than five stars. If Shteyngart weren’t a satirist, he’d probably be considered one of America’s most gifted writers, but satire is his game and he plays it better than possibly anyone. Here’s a writer I will read again.Troy Parfitt is the author of Why China Will Never Rule the World and War Torn: Adventures in the Brave New Canada.

Funny, unapologetic, painfully awkward at times, and indeed, absurd, Shteyngart offers up a contemporary assessment of the reach and fumbles of modern America through the eyes of Misha, a wealthy-by-inheritance Russian who wants nothing more than to return to his true homeland... The United States of America.Misha is obscenely obese, uncontrollably and unabashedly gluttonous, an alcoholic with a cringe-worthy lack of self-control, slightly-criminal, a student of the Marie-Antoinette School of Rich and Ignorant, and a curious, well-meaning, often-loveably oaf. In short, Misha is America.Unforunately, Misha wasn't born in America, and he finds himself struggling to get back to New York after his wealthy gangster father kills an Oklahoma businessman and the entire Vainburg family is barred re-entry from his beloved New York, and from his actual beloved, a round-bottomed, foul-mouthed stripper with a heart-after-gold, Rouenna.His adventures take him to Absurdistan, an ex-soviet state fractured by religious sectarian issues borne from laughable theological debate, overrun with Halliburton contractors, and absolutely lacking in that promised international currency, oil. Misha stumbles into the nascent civil war, and becoming enmeshed with the most corrupt characters by means of his honourable - if misplaced - intentions and his easily-swayed sex-drive.Will Misha manage to detach himself from elite Absurdis pinching his every roll of lard? Will he manage to steal back his Rouenna from that god-awful, classless professor Jerry Shteynfarb? Those questions drive this contemporary reflection on the true absurdity of war, love, and INS.My favourite book of 2012.

Amusant, distrayantUn regard leger sur les reves , les desirs et les illusions d une nouvelle jeunesse russe confrontee aux demons du monde occidental et ses diktatsComme son premier livre , Traite de savoir vivre a l usage des jeunes russes, c est une ballade dans un autre univers parfois aux sentiers quelque peu ardus !

Subversiver Humor, rasante Handlung, ein Mix aus interessanten realen und fiktiven Schauplätzen und jede Menge kluger und bissiger Gesellschaftssatire kennzeichnen diesen ungewöhnlichen Roman, der zwar unterhaltsam, aber trotzdem keine leichte Lektüre ist. Man ist hin- und hergerissen zwischen Abscheu und Sympathie für den fetten Misha, Sohn eines kriminellen St. Petersburger Oligarchen, der im Geld schwimmt, dabei herrlich nichtsnutzig sein Leben verbringt und doch nebenbei versucht, Gutes zu tun. Zum Beispiel seinen Diener nicht allzu sehr zu misshandeln, aus reinem Mitleid mit seiner jugendlichen Stiefmutter zu schlafen, oder einen schwächelnden Dissidenten im Ölstaat "Absurdistan" an Kaspischen Meer vor der Ermordung zu bewahren. Sein Hauptziel aber ist es, endlich wieder ein Visum für die USA zu bekommen, wo seine Geliebte lebt - eine Kellnerin aus der Bronx, die ihn auch noch betrügt.Im Rückspiegel dieser persönlichen Geschichte und scheinbar nebenbei kritisiert Shteyngart die enge Verflechtung des U.S.-Militärs mit der Rüstungsindustrie und mit den Politikern, die von diesem Deal profitieren (auf Kosten der vom Militär besetzten Länder wie z.B. "Absurdistan"), zeichnet ein drastisches und farbenreiches Sittenbild des heutigen Russland und macht sich in äußerst komischer Weise über religiösen Fundamentalismus lustig.Empfehlenswert, witzig und kurzweilig zu lesen, für aufmerksame Leser, die zwischen den Zeilen lesen können, einen guten Sinn für Zynik und Ironie haben mit des Autors Neigung zur Drastik und zur Sentimentalität leben können.

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