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Hard by a Great Forest
by Leo Vardiashvili
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Yes, a lot of it takes place in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. The story is told from the point of view of a young man, Saba. The backstory is that Saba left Georgia as a child with his father and brother during the country’s civil war, claiming asylum and living in Tottenham in London. They couldn’t afford to pay everybody’s passage, so their mother had to stay behind. That’s the first heart-wrenching thing that happens in the book, these boys yearning for their mother. Their father is working himself to the bone, trying to send her money to get her to come. At one point, their father pays someone they call the ‘honest stranger’ a huge amount of money to go to Georgia and bring her back. Of course, this man just takes the money and disappears. There are strong themes of betrayal in this book. The main story takes place when the boys are older. Their father decides he’s going back to Georgia, and he’s a bit mysterious about it—he doesn’t really explain why he’s going. He goes back and falls off the radar. The older brother goes after him, and he too falls off the radar. Then the younger brother, Saba, goes to find out what’s happened, first to his dad and then to his brother. It’s an incredibly vivid picture of this war-torn city and the effects of war and generational trauma. Saba is on this quest and it has a surreal edge to it. There’s been a great storm and animals have escaped from the zoo. He’s in this city, and you don’t know who you’re going to meet. Around one corner there’s a Bengal tiger, then there are wolves. That was a real thing that happened, I’m sure, and a brilliant backdrop to this story. There’s a sense of him going around in circles, which was such a skillful way to give a feel for the life of an asylum seeker and the whole refugee experience.
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"Yes, a lot of it takes place in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. The story is told from the point of view of a young man, Saba. The backstory is that Saba left Georgia as a child with his father and brother during the country’s civil war, claiming asylum and living in Tottenham in London. They couldn’t afford to pay everybody’s passage, so their mother had to stay behind. That’s the first heart-wrenching thing that happens in the book, these boys yearning for their mother. Their father is working himself to the bone, trying to send her money to get her to come. At one point, their father pays someone they call the ‘honest stranger’ a huge amount of money to go to Georgia and bring her back. Of course, this man just takes the money and disappears. There are strong themes of betrayal in this book. The main story takes place when the boys are older. Their father decides he’s going back to Georgia, and he’s a bit mysterious about it—he doesn’t really explain why he’s going. He goes back and falls off the radar. The older brother goes after him, and he too falls off the radar. Then the younger brother, Saba, goes to find out what’s happened, first to his dad and then to his brother. It’s an incredibly vivid picture of this war-torn city and the effects of war and generational trauma. Saba is on this quest and it has a surreal edge to it. There’s been a great storm and animals have escaped from the zoo. He’s in this city, and you don’t know who you’re going to meet. Around one corner there’s a Bengal tiger, then there are wolves. That was a real thing that happened, I’m sure, and a brilliant backdrop to this story. There’s a sense of him going around in circles, which was such a skillful way to give a feel for the life of an asylum seeker and the whole refugee experience."
The Best Adventure Novels: The 2024 Wilbur Smith Prize ·
fivebooks.com
"Hard by a Great Forest has all the ingredients of a dark and twisty fairy tale: A mysterious disappearance, a postwar city teeming with danger, a scavenger hunt, riddles, a road trip, escaped zoo animals, an orphan and a title echoing the first line of Hansel and Gretel. It’s loosely based on author Leo Vardiashvili’s life – he lived through Georgia’s civil war and immigrated to the U.K. as a refugee in the mid-’90s. It’s two decades later in the novel when Saba’s father is pulled back to their homeland in search of something – before promptly disappearing. His last message to his son: Do not follow me. But Saba (of course) follows his breadcrumb trail of clues and, along the way, is forced to confront the question: Can you ever really go home again?"