The philosophical principles on which this system of knowledge is based are presented vaguely but plausibly fundamentally, what the novel grapples with is the broad question of what makes us human. Grounded in something called ‘Hypertext’, it conceptualizes existence and being as a form of language.

And everyone in the world has a chance of encountering someone whom he himself spoke out loud…”Īs the novel progresses, the authors begin to construct a broad outline of the esoteric philosophical ideas on which their school is founded. But only a few of these words become human beings and pronounce other words. Others throw shadows, hideous and pathetic, and sometimes gorgeous and powerful, capable of saving a dying soul. “There are words that are simply trash, refuse, they turn into nothing immediately after they are spoken. They manage to maintain an equilibrium of suspense and plausibility while giving away only the slightest glimpse of what lessons the school intends to instill in its unwilling pupils. This layer of suspense is maintained until nearly the end a prodigious and impressive feat on behalf of the authors. One is not sure what the purpose of the esoteric college is, what the role of its graduates is intended to be, and whether the professors are good or evil. The outstanding quality of the novel lies in its authors’ – the Ukrainian team of Sergey and Marina Dyachenko – ability to maintain a deep layer of suspense and mystery throughout.

Are they being immersed in occult arts? Are their teachers alien beings from another planet? The students aren’t even certain of the intended outcome of their study, or the nature of their college. Once there, they embark on a barely comprehensible course of study, which is designed to completely dismantle the paradigms of material existence they have hitherto taken for granted. Unlike the excited young denizens of Hogwarts, Sasha and her peers are coerced against their will into attending the mysterious college, lest ill consequences befall their family and loved ones. The story follows young Sasha, a high school graduate who’s been planning to enter university and study linguistics until she is recruited by a strange, vaguely menacing man during a beach resort holiday and ordered instead to attend a mysterious college in the little-known, provincial town of Torpa. But it’s far and away a very different beast from J. The book has been described as an “anti-Harry Potter novel”, and insofar as it offers a darker, more mysterious and philosophical version of the ‘magical recruit’ trope, this is true.

Julia Meitov Hersey, translator of Vita Nostra, describes her effort as a work of love, undertaken so that other English language readers will be able to enjoy the delights the Russian-language book first brought her.

Vita Nostra by Marina Dyachenko