Only One Year - by Svetlana Alliluyeva (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

"Among the great Russian autobiographical works: Herzen, Kropotkin, Tolstoy's Confession." --Edmund Wilson, The New Yorker

After the success of her New York Times bestselling childhood memoir Twenty Letters to a Friend, Josef Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva--subject of Rosemary Sullivan's critically acclaimed biography Stalin's Daughter--penned this riveting account of her year-long journey to defect from the USSR and start a new life in America.

The story of Only One Year begins on December 19, 1966, as Svetlana Alliluyeva leaves Russia for India, on a one-month visa, in the custody of an employee of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It ends on December 19, 1967, in Princeton, New Jersey, as she and two American friends join in a toast to her new life of freedom.

That year of pain, discovery, turmoil, and new hope reaches its climax with her decision to break completely from the world of Communism, to turn her back on her country, her children, and the legacy of her notorious father--Joseph Stalin. Why did she make such a drastic choice? This book, a detailed account of reality in the USSR, is her explanation.

Frank, fascinating, and thoroughly engrossing, Only One Year reveals life behind the Iron Curtain, the risks and subterfuge of defection, and one extraordinary woman's fight for her future.

From the Back Cover

In this remarkable memoir, Svetlana Alliluyeva reveals her struggle to break completely from the world of Communism and the legacy of her notorious father --Joseph Stalin-- by defecting from the USSR to the United States.

Only One Year begins on December 19, 1966, as Alliluyeva leaves Russia for India, on a one-month visa, in the custody of a staff member of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It ends on December 19, 1967, in Princeton, New Jersey, as she and two American friends toast to her new life.

Why would a woman flee the only world she has ever known? Brutally honest and moving, Only One Year is the personal story of a dictator's daughter who, trapped behind the Iron Curtain, made the drastic decision to defect. And now--nearly fifty years after its initial publication--Alliluyeva's compelling narrative of suffering, sacrifice, and subterfuge becomes all the more poignant because
her escape ultimately did not bring her the freedom she so desperately sought.

Review Quotes

"Compelling reading from first page to last.... To be Stalin's daughter and to remain human is an admirable accomplishment, and this remarkable book, written with grace and human compassion, is a testimony to a remarkable woman." - Houston Post, ORIGINAL EDITION
"Fascinating, revealing, profoundly human, and significant.... The letters move relentlessly on through deepening tragedy, dark happenings, and deaths." - Los Angeles Times, ORIGINAL EDITION
"It's a rich and absorbing book that could be endlessly quoted, by...a woman who stands free in the sunlight." - Saturday Review, ORIGINAL EDITION
"She is a shrewd observer of character, and her analysis of her father's psychology...is chillingly convincing.... Has an unexpected power to stir speculation and to evoke a strange but vitally significant era." - Baltimore Sun, ORIGINAL EDITION
"This book is not the work of a sensationalist or a traitor. It is wrung from an agonized conscience and a sickened heart.... It is a testament which, someday, one must hope, Russians will be free to read--and will then be grateful to Svetlana Alliluyeva for the witness she has so courageously and movingly borne." - Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., The Atlantic, ORIGINAL EDITION
Praise for Twenty Letters to a Friend: "Twenty Letters to a Friend is fascinating from the first page to the last.... A rich and absorbing memoir.... An illuminating and haunting portrait." - New York Times Book Review
"Among the great Russian autobiographical works: Herzen, Kropotkin, Tolstoy's My Confession." - Edmund Wilson, The New Yorker, ORIGINAL EDITION