Andrey Kurkov | The Kyiv Mysteries

Fri 25 Apr 2025 | 6:30pm - 7:30pm

Andrey Kurkov
Andrey Kurkov book
megan gibson headshot

Ukraine’s greatest living writer, Andrey Kurkov, author of the international best-seller Death and the Penguin, introduces his new series of historical mysteries and his inspirational new character Samson Kolechko who solves crimes amidst the chaos of a war-torn revolutionary Kyiv. The series is based on a cache of historial records from the Kyiv police in the early twentieth century. As well as writing fiction for adults and children, Andrey has become known as a commentator and journalist since the start of the Ukraine war. Join this master storyteller for an event not to be missed. 

In conversation with Megan Gibson 

Venue: Palmerston Room

Duration: 1 hour

In partnership with

Choose your tickets:

 
In-person tickets:
Palmerston Room
  Andrey Kurkov | The Kyiv Mysteries Full Price
6.30pm | 24 April | Palmerston Room at St John's
£17
This ticket is only on sale to members at the moment
  Andrey Kurkov | The Kyiv Mysteries Concession (U25s, unwaged and those feeling the pinch)
6.30pm | 24 April | Palmerston Room at St John's
£10
This ticket is only on sale to members at the moment
    Total: £0
Please wait...
Oops! Something went wrong. Please try again.

Author Biography

Andrey Kurkov was born near Leningrad in 1961, he was a journalist, prison warder, cameraman and screenplay-writer before he became well known as a novelist. He received “hundreds of rejections” and was a pioneer of self-publishing, selling more than 75,000 copies of his books in a single year. His novel Death and the Penguin became an international bestseller, translated into more than thirty languages. As well as writing fiction for adults and children, he has become known as a commentator and journalist on Ukraine for the international media. His work of reportage, Ukraine Diaries: Dispatches from Kiev was followed by the novels The Bickford Fuse, Grey Bees, and Jimi Hendrix Live in Lviv (longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2023), as well as his non-fiction work Diary of an Invasion (2022). 

Chair Biography

Megan Gibson is executive editor, foreign, of the New Statesman.