Red Stars by Davide Morosinotto (review)

Viktor and Nadya are twelve-year-old twins sent away from Leningrad by train in 1941 to protect them from anticipated Nazi occupation, both making entries in notebooks that detail their story for each other and their parents. The two are inadvertently separated, and Viktor receives false news that Nadya’s train was bombed, leaving no survivors. Viktor becomes a prisoner at the Rybinsk gulag and then escapes, braves the winter, and loses three fingers to a cannibalistic couple who want to eat his deceased friend; meanwhile, Nadya joins up with the small group of Soviets at the Oreshek Fortress, strategizes against the Germans, and steals radio parts to get working communication with the outside world. The scrapbook-style notebooks contain “pasted” photos, maps, pamphlets, poems, and blueprints that skillfully set the tone. The format of the novel, originally published in Italian in 2017, is extremely effective, from the two-toned text separating Nadya’s entries from Viktor’s, and the notations from NKVD Colonel Smirnov, who is investigating their case based on the notebooks to determine the twins’ fates in light of the numerous crimes committed. An author’s note address liberties taken with the facts and explains the incorporated images.