The Line

Philippe Matsas (photograph of the author) New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons [A Marian Wood Book], 2010. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. [10], 322, [4] pages. Inscribed by the author on the title page. Inscription reads To Sergei--Olga Grushin. Olga Grushin (born June 1971) is a Russian-American novelist. Born in Moscow to the family of Boris Grushin, a prominent Soviet sociologist, Olga Grushin spent most of her childhood in Prague, Czechoslovakia. She was educated at Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts and Moscow State University before receiving a scholarship to Emory University in 1989. She graduated summa cum laude from Emory in 1993. She became a naturalized US citizen in 2002, but retains Russian citizenship. Grushin has worked as an interpreter for Jimmy Carter, as a cocktail waitress in a jazz bar, a translator at the World Bank, a research analyst at a Washington, DC law firm, and, most recently, an editor at Harvard University's Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. Her first novel, The Dream Life of Sukhanov written in English, was a New York Times Notable Book of 2006, won the 2007 New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, as well as a Top Ten Books of 2006 choice by the Washington Post. The line: the universal symbol of scarcity and bureaucracy that exists wherever petty officials are let loose to abuse their powers. The line begins to form on the whispered rumor that a famous exiled composer is returning to Moscow to conduct his last symphony. Tickets will be limited. Nameless faces join the line, jostling for preferred position. But as time passes and the seasons change and the ticket kiosk remains shuttered, these anonymous souls take on individual shape. Unlikely friendships are forged, long-buried memories spring to life, and a year-long wait is rewarded with unexpected acts of kindness that ease the bleakness of harshly lived lives. A disparate gaggle of strangers evolves into a community of friends united in their desire to experience music they have never been allowed to hear.
The Line is a transformative novel that speaks to the endurance of the human spirit even as it explores the ways in which we love-and what we do for love.
Condition: Very good / Very good.

Keywords: Queue, Kiosk, Strangers, Friendship, Community, Transformative, Novel, Exile, Composer, Concert, Tickets, Longing, Denial, Bleakness, Hope, Philippe Matsas

ISBN: 9780399156168

[Book #83947]

Price: $125.00

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