The Tsar Ordered You to Be Hanged

A Russian writer, living for nine years in a foreign country, in an old house on the Lisbon waterfront, is convinced that his life, like the Tagus River, carries its waters in the only possible direction. But then a strange event occurs, and the ground slips away from under his feet, while a tsunami drives waves from the ocean onto the shore.

“The Tsar Ordered You to Be Hanged” is not only a novel about an innocent person who is accused of murder, or, say, a novel about a young hangman who is selling off the family nest and keeping the ashes of his beloved woman in a hatbox. It is a story of love and enmity, which, even after many years, continue to lead the protagonist through a labyrinth of tragic events, through paths of delusions and seductions, guilt and shame, forcing him to return to the past, open his eyes, and meet his Minotaur.

 Quotes:
“For one who writes about the past, it is not necessary to remember how everything actually was, for he wields a palette knife, which can mix ochre with white paint, but also scratch the palette to clean off the excess. And if sharpened properly, it might even kill, perhaps.”