Saturday, March 5, 2016

Welcome

My website was hacked some time ago and I'm finally getting back to recreating my blog. I'll be reposting some of my earlier blogs here in my new space on Blogger.
October 2012 
It’s been an amazing couple of years for me on the literary front, and after some of life’s unexpected delays, I am very excited and happy to announce that my short story collection Crossing The Border has been released by Little Creek Books (an imprint of Jan-Carol Publishing, who also publish an awesome monthly magazine called Voice for Women: http://www.voicemagazineforwomen.com/).
This collection has been years in the making with the first seeds planted back when I was working on my master’s in Creative Writing at Columbia College Chicago’s Fiction Writing Department.  I tucked away some of my writings in the drawer, not certain if I would revisit them in the future.  Sometime after leaving Chicago, I found an editorial job in Kyiv and moved there, wanting to experience the excitement and reality of an independent Ukraine.
I first set foot in Ukraine in the summer of 1990 when it was still part of the Soviet Union. It was a fast-paced, exhilarating and emotional three-week trip but I knew I wanted to go back. I knew I wanted to live in Kyiv as the tour bus zipped us past hilly slopes and golden-domed churches. I knew I wanted to live there when the bus dropped us off impromptu at a rally at what was then called October Revolution Square (later renamed Independence Square). Hundreds of people were rallying for an independent Ukraine. The stores were bare but the people I met on the streets were welcoming and curious about Westerners and went out of their way to show us the sights, some even inviting me and my traveling companions into their homes.  I loved the sense of 11th-century history embedded in the architecture and streets of Kyiv as I have long been fascinated by ancient and early medieval times.
Six years later I was living in Kyiv and my writing mainly focused on jotting down notes and ideas in my journal and writing some travel and short nonfiction pieces.  When I moved back to the United States nearly four years later, I started writing new pieces and revisiting a few of the old stories I had tucked away. Crossing The Border was finally on its way and I am thrilled and a little nervous about sharing it with the world.
I look forward to your comments and reviews, and most of all, the opportunity to share and exchange thoughts and ideas…..
Until then,
Ksenia

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