The Reconstruction - (Estonian Literature) by Rein Raud (Paperback)

About the Book

"For five years, Enn Padrik has postponed the investigation into the apparently religiously inspired suicide of his daughter and her friends at a commune near Viljandi, but now he cannot do it any longer. He has to travel all over Estonia and even to France to talk to those who might remember anything relevant. Some of these people seem to have been waiting for him, others refuse to talk. And little by little, a bigger and quite unexpected picture starts to emerge. From the late 1970s through 2011, the book spans the lives of two generations, the changes in the world at large and the Estonian society in particular, the transition from a world of rights and wrongs to a world where most things are neither, but the yearning for absolute truths still won't go away."--

Book Synopsis

For five years, Enn Padrik has postponed the investigation into the apparently religiously inspired suicide of his daughter and her friends at a commune near Viljandi, but now he cannot do it any longer. He has to travel all over Estonia and even to France to talk to those who might remember anything relevant. Some of these people seem to have been waiting for him, others refuse to talk. And little by little, a bigger and quite unexpected picture starts to emerge.

From the late 1970s through 2011, the book spans the lives of two generations, the changes in the world at large and the Estonian society in particular, the transition from a world of rights and wrongs to a world where most things are neither, but the yearning for absolute truths still won't go away.

Review Quotes

A subtle, heart-rending Estonian novel about a father in the last few months of his life trying to reconstruct the circumstances of his daughter's suicide...the father and the narrator of this story, which has been translated from the Estonian in straightforward, engaging prose...seeks out other members of the commune as well as people who interacted with Anni before she went there...and no single perspective suffices to explain her life and death. We get different facets of her personality..." "Raud (The Brother, 2016, etc.) treats his narrator and all of his interviewees with respect and allows them to tell their versions of Anni's story. It turns out there are no easy--and ultimately no satisfying--answers to explain Anni's transformation from a bright young schoolgirl to a member of what amounted to a religious cult." - Kirkus Review