Kukolka by Lana Lux

Even since I´ve read Jägerin und Sammlerin by Lana Lux, I planned to read her debut novel as well, but I am always overwhelmed by my TBR. Kukolka - in Ukainian, Little Doll, a term of endearment for beautiful women - waited around three years to awake my interest again. But once I started the book, I just couldn´t focus on anything else.

It is a book that will boil inside you for a very long time. While reading it was feeling the full blow of my own feelings towards the main character and her horrible circumstances. 

Samira is an orphan in the post-communist city of Dnepropetrovsk - we are randomly mentioned the city more than half into the story, while the country we can only doubt, as it is once mentioned the national currency, hryvnia. As her best friednd got adopted in Germany, she is dreaming to join her and one fateful night, she is literally running out of the orphanage to join her. 

But on the way to the train station, she got into the claws of Rocky, a local gang leader that will use her, altogether with other young orphans, to reach his aims: street singing, purses ´cleaning´ and other illegal actions. She joined when she was 7, lured by a promise of getting enough money to travel to Germany. In few years, there is another milestone happening, as she meets Dima, a charming young man, who will actually take her to Germany, but with what a price for her. 

The story is told by Samira herself, with the innocent voice of a child who is caught into a horrible life, but the only she ever knew. There is an expectation of abuse to happen, but nothing prepared me to the extent of it. The story grows in intensity, with Samira sharing unbearable details about her everyday cruelty, when she is not even 15 yo, but the voice remains kind and focused on the moment, without assuming that this could be the rest of her life. Despite the terrible reality, there are kind people who may accompany her although, at least for the time spent begging near the local central station, I kept asking myself why no one really noticed the street children? It feels at times unbearable to accept living on the same planet with child abusers. Indeed, the book is stirring so many intense feelings.

As many other books in German I´ve recently read, Kukolka deserves as well to be translated into English.

Rating: 4.5 stars