Petrov Flu
About This Novel
As the hearse moves forward, fever lingering in the snowy city, the hungover journey turns Petrov into a metaphor for Russian life: an unloved, feverish, languishing family, a feverish world waiting for a magic pill and a tiny bit of love. In Yekaterinburg in the post-Soviet era, a terrible viral influenza is attacking the Petrov family, and the secrets hidden among family members are gradually coming to light. The novel is set in the post-Soviet period and tells the story of a spiritual epidemic prevalent in society. The male protagonist, who is suspected of contracting the flu, is constantly delayed by a weird uncle and a death-seeking writer on his way home. Under the interaction of aspirin and vodka, his gradually blurred consciousness actually escapes into a comic dream of his own creation. The metaphor of influenza depicts the dilapidated status quo of post-Soviet society, especially the old industrial areas of the "Rust Belt", as an infectious disease that no one can escape. Through a flu, it alludes to the loss and anxiety that permeates ordinary people in Russia. People are torn apart by feelings of helplessness and suppressed dreams. Petrov uses the POV perspective to lead us to walk dangerously between delirium and the edge of reality, nihility and madness, just like wandering in Mayakovsky's "Urban Hell". Faced with a life that he was unable to change, he resisted reality with fantasy and kept his love deep in his memories. After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the beliefs of generations were wiped out. During the painful social transformation period, ordinary people fell into the dilemma of value and identity. Everyone paid the price for the shattered dreams, and everyone was looking for the meaning of life again.
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