You might have noticed the sparsity of reviews on the Ramblings lately, as I am still in the depths of Dostoevsky’s “The Adolescent” although reaching the end – it’s a fascinating and neglected book, and I’m looking forward to covering it for the next “Shiny New Books”.

I took a little detour back into Soviet sci-fi earlier in the week with Kirill Bulychev, and the fascinating introduction by Vladimir Gakov ran through the history of Russian science fiction writing and highlighted a book I’d often thought of reading. “Aelita” is probably best known as a pioneering 1920s Soviet film, featuring striking and beautiful sets and costumes by the Constructivist artist Aleksandra Ekster, but Alexei Tolstoy’s novel came first, in 1923. A quick search online revealed that the book was mainly available in a fairly ugly modern edition – until I popped onto Abe and found mention of a Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow version. I own a few books from this publisher, and the listing mentioned a fairly good dustjacket; the cost was more than I would usually pay, but I took a deep breath and sent for it, and I’m *so* glad I did!

aelita cover

As you can see, the small but remarkably well-preserved hardback has a really beautiful cover and it’s in better condition than I expected. The inside is equally lovely too – here’s the title page:

aelita title page

And here’s the first page of the book:

aelita opening

So I’m happy that this was money well spent, and I’d rather have an old and lovely version of a book than a new but modern and dull one – and hopefully this will get to the top of the reading pile soon!

As for any more new arrivals – only one this week! In the Oxfam I spotted this:

riverside villas

If I remember correctly (and that’s always debatable nowadays!) the only Amis I’ve read so far is his poetry, and I liked the sound of this (and also the chapter I read over lunch in Nero) – so this may be a bit of suitable light relief after being absorbed in Fyodor for so long!