Stalina, Emily Rubin
Stalina, Emily Rubin
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Stalina

Author: Emily Rubin

Narrator: Laural Merlington

Unabridged: 6 hr 39 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/11/2012

Synopsis

After the fall of the Soviet Union, Stalina Folskaya’s homeland is little more than a bankrupt country of broken dreams. She flees St. Petersburg in search of a better life in America, leaving behind her elderly mother and the grief of the past. However, Stalina quickly realizes that her pursuit of happiness will be a hard road. A trained chemist in Russia, but disillusioned by her prospects in the US, she becomes a maid at The Liberty, a “short-stay” motel on the outskirts of Hartford. Able to envision beauty and profit even here, Stalina convinces her boss to let her transform the motel into a fantasy destination. Business skyrockets and puts the American dream within Stalina’s sights. A smart, fearless woman like Stalina can go far…if only she can reconcile the ghosts of her past. Obsessed with avenging her family while also longing for a new life, Stalina is a remarkable immigrant’s tale about a woman whose imagination—and force of personality—will let her stop at nothing.

About Emily Rubin

Emily Rubin’s fiction has been published in the Red Rock Review, Confrontations, and HAPPY. She is a past nominee for the Pushcart Prize. In 2005, she began producing Dirty Laundry: Loads of Prose, a reading series that takes place in Laundromats around the United States. She teaches writing workshops and is a television stage manager. She divides her time between New York City and Columbia County, New York with her husband, Leslie, and their dog, Sebastian.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Amanda on February 08, 2011

This was really bad. I did not enjoy it, and only read the whole thing because I wanted to see if anything was actually going to happen. I gave it 2 stars instead of 1 because the author did do a good job of setting scenes and I really felt like I was at that motel front desk with Stalina. I just wa......more

Goodreads review by Roderick on March 29, 2011

Stalina is named after Stalin by her mother, partly to protect her since she was a Jew in the Soviet Union, but also because her mother, though afraid of Stalin, is nevertheless a communist. Stalina trains as a chemist in the Soviet Union, but when she moves to the United States in 1991 finds that th......more

Goodreads review by Nancy on March 29, 2024

I found this book, signed by the author in a Little Library. It is definitely unusual. A Jewish woman, Stalina, leaves her native Russia after the end of the Soviet Union. She ends up working at "short stay motel" in Connecticut. Written in the first person, she makes many comparisons between the US......more

Goodreads review by Lisa on June 11, 2013

What a lovely little story. I took to Stalina straight away and didn't want to put it down.......more

Quotes

“Rubin has created an immigrant tale as forceful, unique, and surprising as her unforgettable heroine.” —Chronogram“A marvelous, captivating debut novel.” —Russian Life Magazine“Rubin’s first novel about a Russian woman’s adventures in America after the fall of the Soviet Union is teasingly matter-of-fact and cat-claw smart…Mordantly funny, deliciously human, Rubin’s tale of a self-possessed survivor brings zest to the literature of immigration and adaptation.” —Booklist

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