One More Year: Stories

1. In “The Repatriates,” a successful Wall Street professional returns to Russia, whereas in “Maia in Yonkers,” Maia leaves her son in Georgia to earn a living and help support her family. In “Asal,” Gulia abandons a more than comfortable material life to work as a nanny in Manhattan, and in “Better Half” Anya interrupts her education in Russia to work in a diner in Upstate New York. Discuss the role that financial decisions play in these stories. How are the characters motivations different from those of other immigrant characters youve read about? What motivations aside from financial ones drive them? Do the stories address a larger theme or message about the role money plays in our life decisions? 

2. Most of the stories in One More Year are about women in relationships that are unresolved in some way or that require certain sacrifices and compromises. Do you see a similar vein through all of the stories? Discuss a common thread with respect to the theme of compromise in relationships. 

“Companion” 

1. When Ilona thinks about the waiter at Delmonicos referring to her and Earl as Mr. Brauer and Mrs. Brauer, she thinks: “Did she really look old enough to pass for his wife? Or were they playing the game, too? Well, it didnt matter to her what those people believed, whether they thought she was his wife or his girlfriend or his mistress. She was happy to cooperate with whatever public fantasy he had planned.” 

How does the idea of “public fantasies” operate in this story? Do you believe Ilona when she says it doesnt matter to her what “those people” believe? What are some other “public fantasies” that people you know perpetuate, passively or actively, in their relationships with others? 

2. What roles do gossip and innuendo play in the story? In what sense is Ilonas situation less scandalous than the rumors? In what ways more desperate? How does Ilona compare to nineteenth- century heroines such as Lily Bart in The House of Mirth, Anna Karenina, or Madame Bovary? In what ways is she similar to or different from these women? 

“Maia in Yonkers” 

1. After speaking with her sister, Maia wonders, “Must every simple decency now be counted?” How is this a telling statement about the link between money and familial obligation in the story? What are the ways in which these “obligations” get outsourced in both families? 

2. Gogi is very particular about the brand-name clothes and electronics he wants his mother to send him. Hes infatuated with a hip-hop style, but when he overhears two black teenagers talking on the ferry, he surprises Maia with a racist comment. Do you see Gogi as prejudiced, or does his statement reveal more complex feelings about visiting the United States? In what other ways is his behavior surprising to Maia? In what ways does he seem younger than the image he projects? 

3. The word deda means mother in Georgian. Gogi calls Maia deda at the end of the story but otherwise uses her first name. Discuss their relationship. Do you think Gogi has learned anything by the end of the story? 

“The Alternate” 

1. What does Victor expect from his meeting with his old lovers daughter? Why is he determined to meet her? 

2. What roles do ambition and envy play in this story? In what ways have Victors aspirations been frustrated by life? Do you think its possible for a person like Victor to be happy? Do you think he has any regrets? 

“Asal” 

1. Gulia feels “invisible” in New York. Walking down the street, she realizes that people are not looking at her and “seeing a servant,” but that they also dont care about her at all. How does Gulias new anonymity influence her thinking and behavior? How is a metropolis like New York liberating for her? How is it disorienting? 

2. Gulia tells Vlad that the Soviets would have punished open polygamy, but “now it is like time is moving backward.” What does she mean by this? In what ways are Gulia and Nasrin, though only five years apart in age, representative of two different eras? 

3. Do you see Rashid as manipulative or do you find him sympathetic? Does he feel as trapped as Gulia and Nasrin or is he alone responsible for his actions? 

“Better Half” 

1. Do you see Anya as a victim, as somebody taking control of her life, or as both? How would you characterize her romance with Ryan? Who has more power in the relationship, in your opinion? 

2. Various characters, including Nick, Alexis, and Anyas lawyer, Erin, address Anya in ways she considers patronizing. How does she tolerate their attitudes in order to benefit from them? Can you think of times in your life that youve done the same? Discuss the role of class in this story. 

“Debt” 

1. What are some ways the storys title applies to the different characters? What are the different types of “debt” at play? 

2. Why does Levs wife, Dina, distrust Sonyas precociousness? Is her assessment fair? 

“The Repatriates” 

1. The theme of “cons” looms throughout “The Repatriates.” What are the large and small ways people con one another in this story? What do you think about the attitude, expressed in the story, that those who get conned have it coming? 

2. How does Grishas frustrated ambition compare with Victors in “The Alternate”? The exploration of religion and spirituality plays a role in both these mens reevaluation of their lives. Do you think there is any connection between their spiritual searchings and their respective success or failure in business? Discuss. 

3. Do you think there are ways in which Grisha is justified in what he is doing? Do you believe that Leras forgiveness of him is genuine? How do you read the last paragraph? 

“There Will Be No Fourth Rome” 

1. Like Gulia in “Asal,” Larisa feels herself at odds with the social changes taking place around her. In what ways are she and Nona mirror opposites of each other? How does Larisa represent a romantic dimension of Russia that is the opposite of the cynical dimension depicted in “The Repatriates”? Do you find Larisa to be a naive or a romantic character? 

2. What do you think of Reginas use of Dr. Spock as a manual for human behavior? Do you believe that “you cant change another persons character, though you can change their behavior”? 

"In her stunning short story debut, Krasikov hones in on the subtleties of hope and despair that writhe in the hearts of her protagonists, largely Russian and Georgian immigrants who have settled on the East Coast. In 'Better Half,' 22-year-old Anya gets a protection order against her husband, Ryan, after he attacks her; he pleads for forgiveness, but, Anya realizes, 'a future with Ryan would be like staying in Russia.' In 'The Repatriates' a man returns to Moscow — to his wife's disappointment — intent on applying to the Russian stock market some tricks he picked up on Wall Street. In 'Maia in Yonkers,' a Georgian immigrant is visited by her son, and the tensions are fierce and palpable. In 'The Alternate,' Victor meets the Americanized daughter of an old love from Russia. Though many of Krasikov's stories are bleak, there are swells of promise; even Lera, whose husband leaves her for another woman, 'suddenly felt nothing but the most pure-hearted compassion for him, a kindness and forgiveness that almost broke her heart.' Krasikov's prose is precise, and her stories are intelligent, complex and passionate." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

@lt;p@gt;One More Year is Sana Krasikov's extraordinary debut collection, illuminating the lives of immigrants from across the terrain of a collapsed Soviet Empire. With novelistic scope, Krasikov captures the fates of people-in search of love and prosperity-making their way in a world whose rules have changed.@lt;/p@gt;

Every so often a new writer appears who is wiser than her years would suggest, whose flesh-and-blood characters embody more experience than a young writer could possible know. Sana Krasikov is one of those writers. Her first published story appeared in the New Yorker, her second in The Atlantic Monthlys fiction issue. One More Year is her debut collection, made up of stories of people who hold out hope, despite the odds, that life will be kind to them.

The characters who populate Krasikovs stories are mostly women–some are new to America; some still live in the former Soviet Union, in Georgia or Russia; and some have returned to Russia to find a country they barely recognize and people they no longer understand. Mothers leave children behind; children abandon their parents. Almost all of them look to love to repair their lives, and when love isnt really there, they attempt to make do with relationships that substitute for love.

Like Jhumpa Lahiri and ZZ Packer, two writers whose fully-realized characters drive their fiction, Sana Krasikov is an exhilarating talent whose first collection puts her on the map with today's most talented young authors.

Sana Krasikov was born in the Ukraine and grew up in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia and in the United States. Her debut collection was named a finalist for the 2009 PEN/Hemingway Award and The New York Public Librarys Young Lions Fiction Award. It received a National Book Foundation's "5 under 35" Award and won the 2009 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature. She is the recipient of an O. Henry Award, a Fulbright Scholarship, and a National Magazine Award nomination. Her stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, The Virginia Quarterly, Epoch, Zoetrope, A Public Space, and elsewhere.

From the Trade Paperback edition.