{"title":"Michael M. Naydan","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"seven-signs-of-the-lion-paperback","title":"Seven Signs of the Lion - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe novel \u003cem\u003eSeven Signs of the Lion\u003c\/em\u003e is a magical journey to the city of Lviv in Western Ukraine. Part magical realism, part travelogue, part adventure novel, and part love story, it is a fragmented, hybrid work about a mysterious and mythical place. The hero of the novel Nicholas Bilanchuk is a gatherer of living souls, the unique individuals he meets over the course of his five-month stay in his ancestral homeland. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThese include the enigmatic Mr. Viktor, who, with one eye that always glimmers, in a dream summons him across the Atlantic Ocean to the city of lions, becoming his spiritual mentor; the genius mathematician Professor Potojbichny (a man of science with a mystical bent and whose name means \"man from the other side\"); the exquisite beauty Ada, whose name suggests \"woman from Hades\" in Ukrainian, whose being emanates irresistible sensuality, but who never lets anyone capture her beauty in a picture; the schizophrenic artist Ivan the Ghostseer, who lives in a bohemian hovel of a basement apartment and in an alcohol-induced trance paints the spirits of the city that torment him; and the curly-haired elfin Raya, whose name suggests \"paradise\" in Ukrainian and who becomes the primary guide and companion for Nicholas on his journey to self-realization.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe hero is summoned to the land of his ancestors to find the \"seven signs of the lion\" in a mysterious quest. The multicultural and unique architectural aspects of the \"city of lions\" with its medieval old town dating back several centuries is showcased. Part cultural history, the novel deals with the legends and myths surrounding the city and its environs. Anglophone readers will be introduced to a country, a people and a culture that largely remain undiscovered for them.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":67576865226975,"sku":"9781911414179","price":29.14,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/8958\/4607\/files\/90InCQ8Aan9781911414179.webp?v=1790387520"},{"product_id":"the-eighth-sign-of-the-lion-paperback","title":"The Eighth Sign of the Lion - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNicholas Bilanchuk vanished from the pages of \u003cem\u003eSeven Signs of the Lion\u003c\/em\u003e mid-crisis, and readers have waited since 2016 to learn what became of him. Now he returns: rising from the fountain in front of the Lviv Opera House, disoriented and only beginning to recover from a traumatic confrontation with forces well beyond the ordinary world.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTo him, no more than a few minutes have passed. In reality, ten years have gone by.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLviv, the city of lions, receives him as it always has: with its cafés and cobblestones, its opera house and its long, layered memory. Nicholas reconnects with old friends who had long assumed he was gone for good, and revisits the loves who shaped his earlier life. Then, at a classical music concert, he meets Andzhela, and something new begins.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe year is 2019. Neither Nicholas nor the city yet knows what 2022 will bring, and that quiet, doomed ordinariness gives the novel an ache its predecessor could not have carried. As Nicholas slowly draws strength from Lviv itself, fragments of the trauma that sent him away begin to surface, memories he has spent a decade, without knowing it, trying not to have. By the novel's end, he is offered something rare: a genuine gift, and a path toward healing.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Eighth Sign of the Lion\u003c\/em\u003e continues the story that \u003cem\u003eSeven Signs of the Lion\u003c\/em\u003e (Glagoslav, 2016) left open, while standing on its own as a novel of memory, love and recovered wholeness, set in one of Europe's most quietly enchanted cities. Michael M. Naydan, internationally recognized as one of the foremost translators of Ukrainian and Russian literature, here turns to fiction entirely his own.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":67914480976095,"sku":"9781804842928","price":24.82,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/8958\/4607\/files\/knI-pudMsF9781804842928.webp?v=1791010240"}],"url":"https:\/\/blackandbarhe.com\/collections\/michael-m-naydan.oembed","provider":"Black \u0026 Barhe Bookstore","version":"1.0","type":"link"}