Nowhere, a Story of Exile
Nowhere, A Story of Exile is a riveting, heart-wrenching story told through a personal medium; through the diary entries of a young girl documenting the organized terror in Baku, her life as a refugee, and her struggle to find herself, all against the backdrop of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Anna gives a voice to a horrific tragedy little reported in the West, to the Armenian population of Azerbaijan and to the child victims of ethnic cleansing everywhere.
Reviews (55)
Ethnic Cleansing and Survival
Gripping story of ethnic cleansing and survival in the the collapse of the Soviet Union. Nationalism in Azerbaijan gave way to ethnic cleansing of the Armenian minority in the chaos following the end of the USSR and this is the tragic story of a child caught up in events beyond her understanding which forced her to leave the homeland she loved. Fantastic read, and significant in helping to understand the after effects of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the frozen conflicts which grew in the wake of the collapse. Will also give insight into the present conflict in The Artsakh Republic (formerly NKR) which is based on the threat of ethnic cleansing of the indigenous ethnic Armenian people whose homeland has been in the Caucasus since before the ethnically Turkish Azeris left Central Asia. And wonderfully crafted, too.
I also fell in love with Yerevan air
Dear Anya, You inspired me to write my own story. I am Armenian from Karabakh and, just when you left to USA, my house was completely destroyed by a missile of mass destruction( "GRAD") which Azeris were using to kill us, Armenians of Nagorno Karabakh. My parents decided, it was too dangerous to stay in Stepanakert , and my Mom and us, 3 kids left to Yerevan, leaving my Grandma and my Dad in Stepanakert. I became a "refugee". I also fell in love with Yerevan air, with freedom of being Armenian and speaking Armenian, with beautiful parks, which in front of my eyes were completely destroyed because ppl needed wood to survive. I also was standing in front of the class and reading out loud in Armenian and trying to hold my tears, and when I looked back the class was rather scared than disgusted with me not being able to read in my own language. When I was leaving to USA, I also felt that I am a selfish traitor for leaving Armenia. I also was mad at our Motherland. But I realized, that its not that our Motherland did not want to help us, its just the times were harsh back then. I came to realize that now I am a DIASPORA and can help our Motherland in so many ways... THANK YOU for your book, it took me back to my childhood to those horrible and unique, bitter-sweet times.
Fascinating!!
Once I started reading NOWHERE, I couldn't put the book down. I found the book to be both very emotional and very educational. I was taken on a journey to Baku and Armenia through this young girl's eyes... A journey that no one should ever have to go on. To read about Anna, her family and friends and what they had to endure, being separated for long periods of time, being terrorized and eventually being forced from their country was shocking. While reading the book, I felt as though I personally knew Anna and her friends during the most difficult times of their lives. It was heartbreaking to read about how Anna lost her childhood for no good reason at all. We truly are very fortunate to live in the United States of America where we enjoy many liberties and freedom. Anna and family must be very strong people, bonded by love, to be able to endure all that they did and immigrate to a foreign country and start a brand new life full of opportunities for them. Thank you for sharing your story Anna!
Must read and pass this book
Thank you Anna for a great book. All of us Armenians from Baku can relate to your story. All of us, who escaped to survive, all of us who went to school and universities in Yerevan and all of us who currently live in USA. I remembered everything as if it was yesterday. We actually lived in the abandoned jail (gahut, you mentioned in your book) for 2 years, before immigrating to America. I would like to express my gratitude and thank you again for your story. Thank you for writing in English, so the kids who were born and raised in the US to Armenian refuges from Baku can read it as well. This month we commemorate the 28th anniversary of the massacre in Sumgait and pogroms in Baku. As always the crime against Armenians went unrecognized and without any consequences. Will time heal wounds, pain and sorrow of the Armenians from Azerbaijan, NEVER. The victims of the atrocities will be always remembered.
Amazing book!
I started reading Nowhere, and I couldn't put it down. Anna does a fantastic job of describing the culture, locations and people in her book (so much so, that the reader is easily transported back to the Soviet Union of the 1980s). I found myself comparing my own life at each point in time to that of Anna and her family, and it made me realize how, as Westerners, we take so much for granted. In Nowhere, Anna does a masterful job of describing the calmness and tranquility of her early life in Baku before her family was forced to flee to Yerevan, Armenia, and then to the United States. As the book evolves, the reader is taken on the journey with her as she watches the world she has always known and loved crumble, forcing her family to move forward in the quest to find a new home. The only thing I am left wanting is MORE. SEQUEL, SEQUEL, SEQUEL, SEQUEL . . .
Gripping
Reading your book is very odd to me because I was one of those many Russian watching the entire scene unfold... it was, just as for you, oddly unreal... I remember the 80s like it was yesterday... I was, of course, older than you and could understand more... yet, the book steered the same feelings I had over 20 years go - bitterness at the utter sinicism of people around me... as stories of horrors penetrated the stonewall of the Russian press, indifference was almost a welcome sign as one did not want to hear cheers of support for the aggressors... my mother's family fled the horrors of pogroms in the Ukraine and endured decades of being blamed for years of everything that was wrong in Russia... Even though it was never said out loud in my family, we all knew that it was just a matter of time before the same events started happening in Russia and the prosecution of Jews started again...the distant reaction to the event only strengthened my mother's conviction that no one would be spared... reading your book, Anna, brought back all those memories and feelings... THANK YOU, for writing the story, for trying to preserve the voice of a child... the innocence that was lost...in all of us...
A story of survival
The Soviet period is an odd time in history - much happened yet little was reported - and when it was, only half truths were told. Azerbaijan, their essence, didn't want them. Armenia, their blood, didn't want them. Russia, their mother, didn't want them. Although every Armenian refugee has a story of their own, Anna described a situation most found themselves in: plain and simple exile. Many won't like to hear the truth, but Anna put it out there in black and white. And I'm so glad she did. The things these people witnessed and suffered through were simply surreal, and it didn't just stop in Azerbaijan. A different kind of torture continued until their arrival to the United States. Many dealt with post traumatic stress, constant fear, discrimination, rejection...you name it. And for what? Why? For simply being born Armenian - something out of their control. More than 25 years after the fact, many cannot speak of the atrocities committed against the Armenians in Azerbaijan. Anna was gracious enough to open her wounds again and discuss what happened to her and the Astvatsaturov family, a reality many Armenians faced. These people faced a strange dichotomy: love your country yet hate it. As a child, Anna felt this twisted relationship and documented the nightmare she lived through in a detailed and captivating way. She was forced out of childhood and uprooted suddenly, yet the natural optimist in her still existed and she often wondered about her old life. Her fear turned into sadness, sadness turned into anger, and from anger blossomed hard work, dedication and will. Within a few years, she was a completely different person. That is the Anna that created this book and vowed to tell the story of a "nobody". For many of us this book will be a reminder of what the United States has represented to many immigrants: freedom from oppression and of course, opportunity for a better life. That is exactly what the case was for Anna's family. Every immigrant has a story. This is Anna's.
Very glad to have this
Affecting, detailed and dramatic memoir about a very under-reported period of guerilla war. Shocking that this is the world we live in. Very glad to have this.
Excellent !!
Went to school with this wonderful, shy, funny person. She was quiet. I wish she would have told more of her story to her friends as we grew to adults. I now know what she went through to get to our country, which some take for granted. It is a must read. I read the whole book without wanting to put it down!
Through the eyes of a child
Anna Astvatsaturian Turcotte, an Armenian author, came to the United States in 1992 as an Armenian refugee. The book "Nowhere a Story of Exile" tells her personal story of being a little girl in the middle of the massacre in Baku, Azerbaijan. As a child, Anna would journalize every day sharing her eye-witness account to the heinous crimes committed by the Azeri's on the Armenian people. Because she was so young she was unable to fully understand the atrocities, but her childhood was completely destroyed, along with her life in Baku. whether she is describing the riots taking place in the streets, the first love she has, or the loss of her grandmother, you begin to take on the perception that you are a child trapped in Baku, Azerbaijan. You feel helpless to the violence which is going on around you, and are looking desperately for a means to escape. You find refuge in the family garden, with your favorite white pomegranate tree. It is the only factor in your life that hasn't been affected by the war. Your family, who once celebrated in that garden, has now withered away. You have been left alone, and can only find comfort in your dreams of moving away. Anna's vivid details help completely immerse the reader. It truly is a remarkable story, and allows the voices of the pogrom survivors in Azerbaijan to be told through Anna.
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