Endling

LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE • WINNER OF THE ASPEN WORDS LITERARY PRIZE • WINNER OF THE GORDON BURN PRIZE • WINNER OF THE ATWOOD GIBSON WRITERS' TRUST FICTION PRIZE • WINNER OF THE WRITERS' LEAGUE OF TEXAS FICTION AWARD • SHORTLISTED FOR THE CLIMATE FICTION PRIZE • SHORTLISTED FOR THE VCU CABELL FIRST NOVELIST AWARD • LONGLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD • FINALIST FOR THE GOVERNOR GENERAL'S LITERARY AWARDS
Set in Ukraine, an eccentric scientist breeding rare snails crosses paths with sisters posing as members of the marriage industry to find their activist mother. As Russia invades, they embark on a wild journey with kidnapped bachelors and a last-of-its-kind snail. This darkly comic novel explores survival, love, and hope in times of encroaching darkness.
A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: THE WASHINGTON POST, THE NEW YORKER, NPR, GOOD HOUSEKEEPING, PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY, THE GUARDIAN, LIBRARY JOURNAL
"The book is funny and smart, full of science, longing and adventure, all the while reminding us what the world stands to lose, and what it has already lost. This is essential reading." —Ann Patchett, bestselling author of Tom Lake
Ukraine, 2022. Yeva is a maverick scientist who scours the country’s forests, trying and failing to breed rare snails. To fund her work, she entertains Westerners who come to Ukraine on guided romance tours believing they’ll find docile wives. Nastia and Solomiya are also entangled in the booming marriage industry, posing as a hopeful bride and her translator. Together, the three women embark on the journey of a lifetime with a truckful of kidnapped bachelors and a last-of-his-kind snail—that is, until Russia invades.
A darkly comic novel, Endling draws on Reva’s own experiences as a Ukrainian expat tracking her family’s delicate dance of survival behind enemy lines. As fiction and reality collide on the page, she probes the hard truths of war: What stories must we tell ourselves to survive? Once shattered, can our sense of normalcy and security ever be restored? Endling is a metafictional tour de force weaving love, loss, humor, and devastation in a story only this author can tell.