Sam Wachman's beautiful, heartbreaking debut novel, The Sunflower Boys, follows a pair of young brothers whose world is upended by the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. As they travel west, hoping to escape the chaos of war and reunite with their father, who has been working in the U.S., narrator Artem captures details of their journey in his sketchbook, creating a poignant account of what he has loved and lost.
Wachman begins his story in peacetime, when Artem's life in Chernihiv, north of Kyiv, is blessedly ordinary. He walks to school with his little brother, Yuri, and best friend, Viktor. Artem is mostly content, but he's starting to wonder two things: one, what it truly means to be a man, and two, if his growing feelings for Viktor will make him a fundamentally flawed man. When Russia launches its attack on Ukraine, Artem and Yuri flee their city. The peaceful, almost pastoral, quality of the novel's early chapters serves to heighten the jarring contrast with the sudden upheaval destruction of war. Wachman depicts the brothers' harrowing journey through small, stark details: blistered feet and clothes stiff with grime, Yuri's stuffed crocodile, and Artem's precious sketchbook, which he carries everywhere, even when he can't draw a thing. As Artem tries to care for Yuri, he continues to wrestle with his feelings for Viktor and his identity in an increasingly chaotic and confusing world.
Tender and poignant, shot through with deep sadness and wry humor, The Sunflower Boys is a bittersweet rendering of life in modern-day Ukraine, the effect of war on ordinary lives, and a young person discovering who he is. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams