{"id":28781,"date":"2023-10-21T08:00:10","date_gmt":"2023-10-21T08:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=28781"},"modified":"2023-10-20T18:29:30","modified_gmt":"2023-10-20T18:29:30","slug":"red-harvest-a-graphic-novel-of-the-terror-famine-in-1930s-soviet-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2023\/10\/21\/red-harvest-a-graphic-novel-of-the-terror-famine-in-1930s-soviet-ukraine\/","title":{"rendered":"Red Harvest – A Graphic Novel of the Terror Famine in 1930\u2019s Soviet Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"
\nBy Michael Cherkas<\/strong> (NBM)
\nISBN: 978-1-68112-320-2 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-68112-323-3<\/p>\n

Win\u2019s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Because Truth is the Greatest Gift\u2026 10\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n

Generally this month varies between Halloween scary stories and material pertinent to Black History month, but today we\u2019re looking at something that is best described as a true horror story. <\/em><\/p>\n

In 1954 Michael Cherkas was born in Oshawa Ontario. He grew up, studying cartooning at Sheridan College in nearby Oakville, before delving deeper into the art world through Illustration and Design courses at The Ontario College of Art in Toronto. A professional graphic artist, cartoonist and art director for over three decades, he has also – with associates Larry Hancock, John van Bruggen, John Sabli\u2019c – winningly blended social commentary with subversion and paranoic science fiction in comics and books like The Silent Invasion<\/strong> quartet and spin-offs The Purple Ray<\/strong>, The New Frontier<\/strong> and Suburban Nightmares<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Cherkas\u2019 family came to Canada from Ukraine, and Red Harvest<\/strong> is a far more personal comics narrative: one he has taken fifteen years to tell\u2026<\/p>\n

The deeply personal passion project details how one prosperous, self-sufficient farming village – Zelenyi Hai – was caught up in and destroyed by the doctrinaire and utterly botched \u201ccollectivization of farming\u201d program initiated by Josef Stalin in 1931. That triumph of dogma over logic, common sense and physical practicality stated that the principles of industrialisation be applied to farming to maximise yields, with the resultant increase being sold to the rich-but-failing capitalist nations to secure much-needed funds and resources.<\/p>\n

It didn\u2019t work out that way and – aggravated by inefficiency and abetted by levels of regional featherbedding and root-&-branch institutional corruption unmatched until the current British Government started handing out contracts during the Covid crisis – resulted in a wholly man-made famine that killed over five million and displaced millions more.<\/p>\n

Ukrainians call that time in 1932 and 1933 the \u201cHolodomor\u201d (literally \u201cdeath\/murder by hunger\u201d). The policy (or naked landgrab) was forcibly applied to the Soviet-controlled (and non-Russian) regions of eastern and central Ukraine, northern Kuban and Kazakstan, with cautious modern estimates reckoning their populations diminished by 35%. However, thanks to decades of Party gag-orders, news-editing and fact-suppression, barely anywhere else knows it ever happened\u2026<\/p>\n

How this graphic novel came about – and particularly the powerful illustrative style used – is discussed in Cherkas\u2019 Introduction<\/em>, and the tale is preceded by a Glossary <\/em>of language used to add impact and colour to this bleak monochrome masterpiece.<\/p>\n

A targeted investigation rather than a straight memoir, the fictionalised saga opens in 2008 as aging Canadian citizen and recently-retired farmer Mykola Kovalenko<\/em> prepares for his first visit to Ukraine since leaving in 1942. The big event has made him anxious and he\u2019s started dreaming of the past and remembering\u2026<\/p>\n

What follows is a compelling yet engaging narrative exposing a war crime and systematic genocide the world has been happy to forget. Rendered with wit, tact and great reserve, it adds meat to history\u2019s bones, tracing the slow, gradual, hopeless decline and repercussions very much in the manner later employed in George Orwell\u2019s Animal Farm<\/strong>. That author also knew human nature, political chicanery; he has painful inescapable truths and a bit of history\u2026<\/p>\n

Cherkas is astoundingly adept at giving the many contributory factors and factions human faces: by turn hopeful, enthusiastic, stoic, enduring, fanatical, ruthless, crushed, despondent and ultimately hopeless. By blending Mykola\u2019s contemporary return with the concatenation of cozening deceptions, betrayals, mismanagements, brutally enforced separations, family divisions and stupid changes applied with ruthless inefficiency by Party Officials local and Russian, the author has shone a light on a story that never goes away and never ends happily.<\/p>\n

Couched in terms of a family drama, Red Harvest<\/strong> is potent, and unforgettable: a dish we should all dip into and accept that sometimes bitterness is the best we can aspire to.
\n\"\"
\nRed Harvest is \u00a9 2023 by Michael Cherkas. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.<\/p>\n

Red Harvest<\/strong> will be released on November 14th<\/sup> 2023 and is available for digital and physical copy pre-orders now.<\/p>\n

Most NBM books are available in digital formats. For more information and other great reads see http:\/\/www.nbmpub.com\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Michael Cherkas (NBM) ISBN: 978-1-68112-320-2 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-68112-323-3 Win\u2019s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Because Truth is the Greatest Gift\u2026 10\/10 Generally this month varies between Halloween scary stories and material pertinent to Black History month, but today we\u2019re looking at something that is best described as a true horror story. In 1954 Michael Cherkas was … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Red Harvest – A Graphic Novel of the Terror Famine in 1930\u2019s Soviet Ukraine”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[115,239,122,170],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biography","category-drama","category-historical","category-non-fiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-7ud","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28781"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28785,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28781\/revisions\/28785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}