
Purge by Sofi Oksanen is a gripping and intense story set in Estonia, spanning several decades from the Second World War to the early 1990s. The novel revolves around the lives of two women, Aliide and Zara, who are connected through a shared history filled with oppression, occupation, betrayal, and survival. Through detailed flashbacks and intertwining storylines, the author skillfully weaves a narrative that explores themes of sexual violence, secrets, treachery, and the impact of war on human emotions. The book delves into the complex history of Estonia, addressing the horrors of Nazi and Soviet occupations, as well as the modern-day issue of sex trafficking in Eastern Europe.
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Sensitive Topics/Content Warnings
Content warnings include graphic descriptions of sexual violence, trauma, abuse, and themes surrounding human trafficking.
From The Publisher:
Soon to be published in twenty-five languages, Sofi Oksanen's award-winning novel Purge is a breathtakingly suspenseful tale of two women dogged by their own shameful pasts and the dark, unspoken history that binds them.
When Aliide Truu, an older woman living alone in the Estonian countryside, finds a disheveled girl huddled in her front yard, she suppresses her misgivings and offers her shelter. Zara is a young sex-trafficking victim on the run from her captors, but a photo she carries with her soon makes it clear that her arrival at Aliide's home is no coincidence. Survivors both, Aliide and Zara engage in a complex arithmetic of suspicion and revelation to distill each other's motives; gradually, their stories emerge, the culmination of a tragic family drama of rivalry, lust, and loss that played out during the worst years of Estonia's Soviet occupation.
Sofi Oksanen establishes herself as one the most important voices of her generation with this intricately woven tale, whose stakes are almost unbearably high from the first page to the last. Purge is a fiercely compelling and damning novel about the corrosive effects of shame, and of life in a time and place where to survive is to be implicated.
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About the Author:
Sofi Oksanen is a Finnish-Estonian novelist and playwright. Purge is her first novel to appear in English, and the first novel to win Finland's two most prestigious literary awards, the Finlandia and the Runeberg.
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