No Country for Love

By: Yaroslav Trofimov

Narrated by: Kristin Atherton

Seventeen-year-old Debora Rosenbaum, ambitious and in love with literature, arrives in the capital of the new Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, Kharkiv, to make her own fate as a modern woman. The stale and forbidding ways of the past are out; 1930 is a new dawn, the Soviet era, where skyscrapers go up overnight. Debora finds work and meets a dashing young officer named Samuel who is training to become a fighter pilot. They fall in love, and begin to mix with Ukraine's new cultural elite.

But Debora's prospects—and Ukraine's—soon dim. State-induced famine rolls through the over-harvested countryside, and any deviation from Moscow-dictated ideology is punished by disappearance. When Samuel is sentenced to ten years' hard labour, Deborah is left on her own with a baby. And this is only the beginning. As advancing Nazi armies move through Ukraine during World War II, its yellow fields of wheat run red with blood. Forced to renounce the man she loves, her identity and even her name, Debora also learns to endure, manipulate and resist.

No Country for Love follows the hard choices Debora makes as Ukraine, caught between two totalitarian ideologies, turns into the deadliest place in the world—while she tries to protect those she loves most.

A sweeping, stunningly ambitious story about a young Ukrainian girl arriving in Kharkiv in 1930, determined to contribute to the future of her country, and her struggle to survive the devastation and trauma that ravage Ukraine.

©2024 Yaroslav Trofimov (P)2025 W. F. Howes Ltd.

The compelling story and brilliant inclusion of the history as it is woven throughout the story

Loved the way the history backgrounds the story. The different roles are acted extremely well.

Intimate Experience of War & Stalin

Scary prelude of and what’s actually happening in Ukraine now and the successes of the current authoritarian attempts of Russia to take over the world.

I am a huge fan of historical fiction set in Eastern Europe, and or Russia.

Loved the breadth of historical events covered in an entertaining manner. The story was engaging.

A past to vividly remember.

I have enjoyed every line every second.
Imposible to put down.
Hoping that Ucrania find
Soon peace and that this won’t happen again .

How war changes everything!

Early, egar love may last or may not. War changes character in people because of separation, family needs n wants, environment and leadership, etc. I cannot find 1 positive element about any war.