Debra Dean: The Madonnas Of Leningrad

“What was beautiful?” Helen had asked the young man, puzzled.

“Everything, man. That’s what was so amazing. There’s a killer view of the straits, but she was pointing at everything, you know, this dead madrona tree out back, and these bands of sunlight coming through the roof in the garage.” Here, the young man’s expression had turned very earnest. “It was like she was saying everything was beautiful.”

The doctor said Marina was in shock, but Helen has always preferred the young man’s explanation. “You had to be there,” he insisted. “She was showing me the world.”

While the characters in this novel are fictional, the wartime events are drawn from historical records. Readers interested to learn more about the Siege of Leningrad might wish to read Harrison E. Salisbury’s The900 Days: The Siege of Leningrad; S. P. Varshavskii’s The Ordeal of the Hermitage ; and Cynthia Simmons and Nina Perlina’s Writing the Siege of Leningrad: Women’s Diaries, Memoirs, and Documentary Prose . The State Hermitage Museum also has an expansive website (www.hermitagemuseum.org) that provides history, digital reproductions of the collection, and panoramic views of various rooms in the museum.

Many people have had a hand in shepherding this book along. My grandparents’ lifelong love affair and their journey with Alzheimer’s provided an initial inspiration. Gratitude goes also to Clifford Paul Fetters, my first and best reader, whose faith never wavered, and to my parents, Beverly Taylor and Ed Dean, for their love and financial support. Thanks to Stuart Gibson and the guides and researchers at the State Hermitage Museum who so graciously answered my endless questions; to Eric Kinzel and Yekaterina Roslova-Kinzel for advice on things Russian; to Cynthia White, Susan Rich, and Linda Wendling for their generous reads; to Mark Elliot for information on the Soviet repatriation; to San Juan County Sheriff Bill Cumming and Undersheriff John Zerby for advice on search and rescue. The Barbara Deming Memorial Fund came through with a grant and the attendant vote of confidence just when it was needed. I am deeply indebted to Claire Wachtel and the good people at William Morrow for their enthusiasm, and most especially to agents Marly Rusoff and Michael Radulescu for voting with their hearts. Finally, to the people of St. Petersburg, Russia, it’s my humble intent that this book will honor their great story.

Debra Dean worked as an actor in the New York theater for nearly a decade before opting for the life of a writer and teacher. She lives with her husband in Seattle, Washington. The Madonnas of Leningrad is her first novel. www.debradean.com

“Somewhere there is…” from The Complete Poems of Anna Akhmatova, translated by Judith Hemschemeyer, edited and introduced by Roberta Reeder. Copyright © 1989, 1992, 1997 by Judith Hemschemeyer. Reprinted by permission of Zephyr Press.