Ice

By Vladimir Sorokin and Vladimir Sorokine

Drugs, sex & violence are the currency of daily life in Moscow. But in the midst of so much squalor one mysterious group is pursuing a long-mediated plan. With a strange shared attraction to a chunk... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1590171950
• ISBN13: 9781590171950
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: New York Review of Books, Incorporated, The
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.07 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.8" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Violent, brilliant, prophetic

Sorokin is one of the top contemporary Russian writers. His explosive imagination has no boundaries. To me, he is Alfred Schnittke of literature: poli-stylistic language, amazing sense of structure, big universal vision of life define those two great creative minds. "Ice" is an overwhelming journey. Enjoy it!

Very much in the middle of the contemporary Russian trends

Sorokin's "Ice" is a good representative of a modern trend in Russian literature and film. The novel starts with the scene in Moscow, where several, so it appears, thugs, performing a sadistic experiment: they maniacally hit a blond and blue-eyed man on the chest with a hammer made of a block of ice. As it turns out, the purpose is to find another member of a secret community, who can be recognized because he would cry out the name of his heart, his true name, after being hit with ice. And not just the ordinary ice, but only the ice from the remains of the Tunguska meteorite, the ideal cosmic substance... There are exactly twenty-three thousand of brothers and sisters, dispersed around the globe and when all would be found, they will rule the world and get it to the end. The book is interesting and dynamically written, although the plot gets a little predictable after a while. There are chosen people in hiding, forming a secret society opposing the present reality, there are hints of a new dictatorship, a Russian curse, there is brutality and money-oriented attitude of the ordinary people who want to survive in the changed world around them. The mix of science-fiction and contemporary Russian reality is a common theme exploited by many authors. I think Pielewin in "Generation"P"" did it better, because he managed to shed some light on a real problem, Russia dealing with capitalism and consumer society. The classic of this genre is, of course, the movie "Nightwatch" ("Nocznyj dozor"), a must-see for everyone. Having said that, I would like to add that Sorokin writes skillfully and the novel reads well. The descriptions of the mystic experiences of "heart to heart" love between brothers and sisters are quite remarkable. "Ice" is a good book, it is just not a new subject (except for being a satire on a modern sectarian language) and there were others who did it better.

The best contemporary Russian writer

This one has no ritualistic hyperviolence, anal sex among Communist party leaders, chapters of nearly impenetrable dialogue in "New Chinese". Ice ("Liod") is the slickest, least formally challenging and graphically brutal book so far, that is nevertheless quite mysanthropic at its core. Sorokin is actually using a "Star Wars"-type of a marketing tool: initially releasing part 2 of a trilogy (the prequel, "Put' Bro" was released in Russia a year later, and last year saw the release of the entire trilogy, concluded by the part 3, "23000") I have not read any of Sorokin's books in english translation, so cannot vouch that it does justice to the originals. He is a very powerful contemporary Russian writer and definitely deserves attention of those who enjoy the works of Pelevin and WM Burroughs.