There's really no way to approach Vita Nostra but elliptically, so strap in. By way of orientation, imagine that Hogwarts has opened a satellite campus inside Harry Haller's Magic Theater from Steppenwolf by Hermann Hesse, and assigned Kafka, Dostoevsky and Rod Serling to oversee the curriculum. This circumstance is likely to incite one of three reactions from readers: befuddlement, terror or magnetic attraction. When you crack the spine of the latest novel from acclaimed Ukrainian authors Marina and Sergey Dyachenko, you'll get a full measure of all three, and just as with the famed five stages of grief, you may experience any or all of them out of order, and more than once.

Vita Nostra starts out simply enough, with teenager Sasha Samokhina colliding with a strange man who exudes an unexplainable influence over her. Drawing her under his spell, the girl's unbidden mentor persuades her to enroll in the Institute of Special Technologies, much to her confusion and her mother's consternation. Once there, the lesson plan is—to put it mildly—fairly opaque, and academic failure is met with unpleasant consequences for the students' families.

The novel belongs to an expanding Ukrainian genre known as fantastyka, encompassing science fiction, fantasy, horror and folkloric traditions. Much of this genre has not yet been translated into English. This particular exemplar could claim both Piers Anthony's Macroscope (1969) and Jonathan Lethem's As She Climbed Across the Table (1997) as antecedents from the sci-fi realm, but also Jose Luis Borges' Ficciones (1944) and Alain Robbe-Grillet's Instantanés (1962) from the lit-fic sphere. Kudos are due to translator Julia Meitov Hersey, whose task cannot have been a simple one, given Vita Nostra's complexity and sophistication.

I realize that this is a bit of a tease, but if you are at all intrigued by the phrase, "Time is a grammatical concept," you will find yourself swept into this book's estimable vortex from page one.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Touted as the definitive English-language edition of this internationally acclaimed Russian novel, originally published in 2007, this work begins with Sasha, an ordinary teenager studying special technologies at a remote university far from her family home. Always a good student, Sasha is dismayed to find her textbooks filled with gibberish. The professors are intimidating and perhaps not human. As Sasha makes and then loses friends as her talents manifest, she realizes that failing will put her and her family in danger, and she'll have to overcome her greatest fear: who she'll become if she succeeds. As Sasha explores the philosophy of being and consciousness, readers are immersed in a world in which all reality is suspect. Longtime collaborators, the Dyachenkos deftly create a supernatural environment without using magic, spells, or potions. VERDICT Recommended for readers who appreciate the intensity of student bonding in extreme situations, such as in Donna Tartt's The Secret History or Lev Grossman's The Magicians, and the magical realism of Neil Gaiman, Jorge Luis Borges, and Haruki Murakami.—Catherine Lantz, Univ. of Illinois at Chicago Lib.

The Dyachenkos' 2007 novel takes the trope of young people selected for a school for magic and transforms it into an unnerving, deeply philosophical coming-of-age tale. A mysterious man asks 16-year-old Sasha Samokhina to perform a series of bizarre, potentially humiliating tasks that lead to her admission to the enigmatic Institute of Special Technologies. There, students are confronted with unreadable texts and demanding professors, and their obedience is enforced by threats of harm to their families. Sasha excels at the mind-bending, body-transforming "special technologies"; her prodigious talent links her to the hidden mechanics of time, space, and reality itself. But there are no comforting elements of wish-fulfillment in this school story. Her ordeals are frequently harrowing, and all too often she seems nearly powerless in the face of forces that are manipulating and shaping her into something beyond mere humanity. She is nevertheless a sympathetic heroine, and readers will gladly follow her fascinating, disturbing story to its transcendent conclusion. Hersey's translation is plain and straightforward, a wise choice that enhances the deep strangeness of this trippy, vivid novel. Agent: Joshua Getzler, HSG. (Nov.)

Originally published in Russian, this modern fantasy follows Sasha Samokhina as she is unwillingly recruited and forced to attend the mysterious Institute of Special Technologies. The teachings seem nonsensical, and failure comes at a high cost, sometimes resulting in the untimely death of a close relative. Through fear and coercion, the students learn at an accelerated speed, unlocking secrets to higher human potential and beyond. The lyrical writing will appeal to those who favor magical realism, and the college atmosphere grounds the novel in the real world. Readers will look forward to the next installment of this fascinating, strange tale. Recommended to fans of Lev Grossman's The Magicians and Katherine Arden's The Bear and the Nightingale. VERDICT A must-purchase for libraries serving fantasy-loving mature teens.—Melanie Leivers, Palm Beach Country Library System, FL