The Dreamtime

DEBUT First published in 2020 at a video-art exhibition in Kyiv, this debut novel from internationally renowned Ukrainian war correspondent Chernov weaves together four interlocking narratives. A traumatized doctor becomes actively involved in the Ukrainian-Russian conflict at the beginning of the war in 2014, a woman cares for her sick father during the bombing of Slovyansk, a dangerous fugitive flees the authorities, and a forensic scientist works on a murder case while coping with her difficult marriage to a former soldier. Setting his novel in Ukraine’s Donbas region, Southern Europe, and Southeast Asia, Chernov uses the Australian Aboriginal concept of Dreamtime to merge creation myths and collective imagination with the reality of war. What results is a documentary masquerading as a novel that, at 600 pages, still boasts crisp writing and engaging dialogue. Scene by scene, Chernov vividly describes battles fought in the streets, the bombing and shelling of apartments, and the dreams of those on the front lines, physically and psychologically.