A reading by Larissa Shmailo from the newly released book

Dora / Lora is a harrowing account of the Ukrainian Holodomor (mass starvation of the 1930s) and the role of Ukrainian collaborators in the Nazi death camps seen through the lens of one family's experience. Intergenerational Holocaust trauma is agonizingly depicted (suppose your parents joined the wrong side?). The political is personal in this gripping collection.

Larissa Shmailo is a poet, novelist, writing coach, translator, editor, and critic. Larissa facilitates the workshop Writing Resilience for people affected by trauma, addiction, and/or mental illness; she also works privately with neurodiverse students. Larissa's novels are Sly Bang and Patient Women; her poetry albums are The No-Net World and Exorcism, for which she won the New Century Best Spoken Word Album award. Larissa is the original English-language translator of the first Futurist opera Victory over the Sun performed at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Garage Museum of Moscow, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and theaters and universities worldwide; Larissa also edited the anthology Twenty-first Century Russian Poetry. Please see more about Larissa at her website www.larissashmailo.com or at Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larissa_Shmailo

Watch on You-Tube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yygv8ugLZI

Vaccination cards and masks required

Russian-American Cultural Center programing is made possible by part with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, Cojeco and Tianaderrah Foundation.