This unique collection of essays offers a glimpse into life in and around Kharkiv during the first two years of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. A Kharkiv native, Vikoriia Grivina reflects on living in a city where days are full of poetry readings and gallery openings, while nights are saturated with air raids and explosions. The chronicle of everyday life is layered with inquiries into the urban history and mythology of the 20th-century Kharkiv, a look at the city’s decolonial processes, new activist communities, and also the re-discovery of the 1920s literary movement known as the Ukrainian Executed Renaissance. The collection also comprises a fictional story that explores some of the darker, irrational fears and imaginations of urban dwellers during war.

“Viktoriia Grivina’s Kharkiv essays are simultaneously devastating, enchanting, unsettling, and eye-wateringly funny. Only someone with a depth of understanding of the city’s past, and an intimate, lived knowledge of its war-ravaged present could write these lines. Grivina’s deep love for her city comes across in the near magical realist descriptions of Kharkiv’s urban landscapes, from the careworn courtyards of the residential high-rises to the electric summer storms that rip through the city’s skies. A compelling new voice from Ukraine that rings with the fury of a nation forced to fight for the preservation of its cultural identity.” —Victoria Donovan, Professor of Ukrainian, St. Andrews University
“In the two years since the start of the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Viktoriia Grivina emerged as one of the most important voices documenting the Ukrainian resistance. This book paints a powerful picture of a defiant city where the Ukrainian decolonial spirit thrives in a vibrant cultural scene alongside daily war atrocities. Through a collection of brilliant and punchy essays, Grivina shows why Russia is so obsessed with decimating Kharkiv. Despite generations of historical and cultural erasure, the unbreakable city manages to preserve its authentic Ukrainian story that centers Ukrainian resistance and challenges Russian imperial myths.” —Maxym Eristavi, journalist, author of “Russian Colonialism 101”