A novel that touches all of our humanity. The saga begins with Wilhelm's mysterious prophetic dream, one with deep ironic symbolism and a panoramic meaning that unfolds for him as the years pass by.
Four brothers of German ancestry are trapped in a provincial Russian town just before the Bolshevik Revolution. They are separated and forced to witness the most climatic events of the early twentieth century. Two of the brothers emigrate to the United States and travel the railways of the Midwest. They reflect upon the similarities and differences of the people and landscapes of the American prairie and the vast Russian steppes. Look for the Pawnee Indian who is ironically, yet accurately, portrayed as a distrusted immigrant on his own ancestor's soil.
The effective use of language, dialogue, and imagery keep the story flowing. One of the most difficult challenges other authors experience is trying to incorporate historical narrative within the framework of a storyline. BJ Lee keeps the reader informed as to what the characters encounter in their travels as well as what the "big picture" is in relation to world events.
Conrad is a man without a country, trapped in the midst of a planet in chaos. He struggles to keep his center. Enslaved by a band of roaming nomads, his destiny is to one day escape and return to his Russian lover Katerina in Petrograd at the peak of the Russian Revolution. They devise a plan, with the assistance of a local radical poet and revolutionary, to rescue his youngest brother, Jacob, from a gulag in Siberia.
The ending is amazing. A fantastic conclusion to a meaningful epic of global conflict and simple family devotion.
The Story Behind This Book
This manuscript sat in a box in my garage for almost ten years, until one day I brought it out again and took a second look at it. I almost tossed it when I first wrote it, but when I read it a decade later I couldn't believe my eyes! This novel had flowed from my heart and soul onto paper. I thought, this is really good! When I tried to find my original it was on 3X5 floppy disks that were password protected. Guess what? I couldn't remember the password! I had to scan each page of the hard coopy on my scanner, convert it to editable text with a special program, then get it in workable files on my computer. Painstaking and time-consuming to say the least! It took weeks. When I had rescued the final draft I polished it over and over again, then gave it an ending that was unforgettable. I tried to shorten it but that was impossible. It just kept wanting to reveal more to me about the characters and the times. An amazing experience and one that left me with a feeling of awe and that I had left my footprint for the old ones who came from Russia, the Pastor that died there, and future generations. I felt I had written a masterpiece that I could never exceed. It is definitely my Pièce de résistance and a portrait of humanity that holds true in any lifetime. The characters when I created them sprung to life as I wrote it and the events unfolded in ways I had never dreamed possible. I think this book crosses many genres.