These 20 stories, collected from diverse regions of Ukraine during the full-scale invasion, speak of courage, resilience, pain, death, love, and hope.

After Russia attacked Ukraine from the north, east, and south in February 2022, many Ukrainians had to put their lives on hold to protect the very possibility of living in their homes. While telling wartime stories of people of different backgrounds, this book also delves into the wider historical, political, and cultural context of life in Ukraine.

How did two friends save hundreds of civilians, and how did one restaurant manage to feed a besieged city? What is it like to live under Russian occupation? What does a former businessman feel as he evacuates the bodies of fallen soldiers, day after day? Why do some people choose to live amid the rubble of their homes? And what is it like to fight continuously for ten years? Each of these 20 stories reveals an important theme of life during the full-scale war, with all its difficulties, hesitations, and inner conflicts, when reality sometimes surpasses fiction.

Autorentext
Bohdan Benis a freelance author, journalist, and philosophy researcher based in Ukraine. He has been writing for Euromaidan Press since 2018, covering Ukrainian culture, history, political reforms, and the war.

Klappentext

When in February 2022 Russia attacked Ukraine full-on from the north, east, and south, a Kyiv Theology Professor joined the Ukrainian defense as a sniper and left the city to fight near Chornobyl. Elsewhere, a small group of Chernihiv residents rescued thousands of locals from the besieged city, using hidden roads to bypass Russian soldiers. Others found themselves under Russian occupation, living in constant fear of Russian soldiers entering their yards. In the midst of war, reality surpasses any fiction. What does the former businessman feel when he evacuates the bodies of fallen soldiers, day after day? Why do some people choose to live in the rubble of their flattened homes? How do Ukrainian soldiers who survive only because of an amputation cope with recovery, and how do Ukrainian rehabilitation specialists cope with the surge of patients? What continues to motivate people to fight who just yesterday didn t believe such a war was possible? These 21 stories, collected from diverse regions of Ukraine since the beginning of the 2022 full-scale invasion, speak of courage, resilience, pain, death, love, and hope.