Александра Крючкова – Ангел-Хранитель. A Guardian Angel. Премия им. Оскара Уайльда. Билингва: Ru-Eng (страница 5)
Like all novels by A. Kryuchkova, «A Guardian Angel» is worthy of a luxury movie! Well, a sequel to the story follows! «Confession of a Ghost», a new philosophical-mystical novel in the «Playing Another Reality» series, has already been awarded the prizes of D.L. Andreev «Creator of Worlds» (Open Literary Club «Response», 2019) and F. M. Dostoevsky «Life suffocates without purpose» (Union of Writers of Russia, 2021). I sincerely join in congratulations to the writer and look forward to read her next novels!
«Literary News» No. 11—12 (197—198), November-December 2021
«Angels and stars. Marina Tzvetaeva, Evgeny Rein and Alexandra Kryuchkova» by B. Mikhin
The novel «A Guardian Angel» by Alexandra Kryuchkova is a multifaceted work in which everyone will see something different. For me personally, it’s not just an unusual novel about the search for earthly love and the passions of a love triangle with a detective flare, astrological handwriting and charming self-irony of the writer. By the way, as Peter Guldedava, the honored writer of the Union of Writers of Russia, remarked in a review (hereafter I quote the preface to the previous edition of the novel in «RIPOL Classic», 2015),
Celestial aftertaste from reading the novel was also left by the Orthodox writer-publicist Inna Butorina,
«A Guardian Angel» for me is not even so much a fascinating and enlightening «Playing Another Reality» (as the title of the series suggests), due to which the reader certainly penetrates the Subtle Spheres, including the worlds of angels, ghosts and dreams, to overcome their own fears and complexes and rewrite a multi-variant Future, what is legitimately admired by Irina Lejava, a science fiction writer,
For me, «A Guardian Angel» by A. Kryuchkova, on the one hand, is a splendid novel about a lady with strong Spirit (obviously not the iron lady), who is balancing, like a circus performer, on a thin thread, stretched over the abyss of Non-existence, and dancing with Death. Death either retreats, taking a step back, or pounces on Alice suffocating her in its passionate embrace. This novel is about the struggle with Death in its different guises, not even of a particular person, but of Life itself.
Almost the same was said by the writer Elena Gramenitskaya,
And for me, reading Kryuchkova’s books is like meditating. Both Alexandra’s poetry and her prose – no less poetic! – have an inexplicable magic effect, as noted in the reviews by Elena Tallenika («The Island of Charon»), by Konstantin Bely («A Trap for a Thought-Form»), by Peter Guldedava («The Moon Cat» and «A Guardian Angel»). This magic, quite unobtrusively, but persistently and powerfully influences the reader, making him think not only about mortal things, while every novel by Kryuchkova is a discovery, a clear non-standard, a break of the patterns, a puzzle, a charade, something unusual.
I agree with Vadim Shiltsyn, writer and critic,
On the other hand, «A Guardian Angel» represents a cross-section of an entire decade, our literary history with the star names of the era, that emerges before the reader’s eyes, since the writer describes real events taking place in the literary circles of the early 21st century. The reader takes part in the Tsvetaeva’s bonfire in Elabuga, wanders through book exhibitions in Paris and London, goes to the seminars of Eugene Rein and Viktor Erofeev at the Booker Laureates’ School in Milan, travels to Venice to the grave of Joseph Brodsky, visits the 3rd International Poetry Festival in Hungary, oversees preparations for and holding «The King of Poets» tournament in the Central House of Writers in Moscow, acquaints with the imperial «Heritage» and plans a trip to the festival «I Love This World!» in Bulgaria.
In my opinion, it’s interesting, because, first of all, these events are not ordinary, but significant for their time, and second, the writer was directly involved in them, so the reader has the opportunity to plunge into the real literary environment and touch the celebrity personalities, which is much nicer than reading dry information from encyclopedic reference books.
What about the writer? What is her role in the events described?
Since 2001 Alexandra Kryuchkova has actively participated in literary events in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and her first performance abroad was on 11 April 2010 at the invitation of Carte Blanche Czech Republic, with pianist Philippe Subbotin, Director of the Gradus ad Parnassum music school at the Russian Center for Science and Culture in Prague (Czech Republic). It was a three-hour musical and poetic concert at the St. Mary’s Church in Prague (Kostel Panny Marie Snezne) with a video broadcast on Russian television in Prague.
In September 2011, thanks to the Union of Writers of the 21st Century and its President Evgeny Stepanov, Alexandra Kryuchkova represented Russia at the 3rd International Poetry Festival in Hungary, organized with the support of the international cultural and creative foundation E.O.S., headed by poet and translator Aron Gaal. After performances in Budapest, Szentendre and Isáseg, she was announced as the winner of the Festival and had her book translated into Hungarian in Budapest published free of charge. Her name was engraved on a memorial stone in the Park of Stars on the Walk of Fame. She was awarded the Order of G.R. Derzhavin by the Union of Writers of Russia. After the publication of her book «Ez a – Szerelem!» («This is Love!»), a selection of poems translated into Hungarian by A. Gaal, Alexandra was awarded the international Hungarian prize «New Pleiades» 2012 for her merits in the field of literature.
Later Kryuchkova, as a poet and writer, represented Russia as part of the delegation of the Union of Writers of Russia at the book fair in Paris (2012), where indeed, as in the novel, she spoke with the French Minister of Culture. The she was a speaker at the conference «The New Russian Revolution in Literature» organized by Edizioni Spirali Italian Publishers in Milan (2012); held master classes at the Literary Festival in Varna (Bulgary) and read poetry at the Union of Bulgarian Writers, where she met the legendary Bulgarian poet and translator Elka Nyagolova, who had translated Kryuchkova’s poetry into Bulgarian. Alexandra performed at the book fair in London (2013) and led a literary tour in Italy (2014) as the head of the delegation of writers and poets. She was the initiator of the international projects of the Moscow State Organization of the Union of Writers of Russia such as Russia-Czech Republic, Russia-Germany, Russia-Hungary, Russia-Spain, Russia-Italy, Russia-Greece. Each of her foreign performances and international projects were awarded diplomas of the Moscow State Organization of the Union of Writers of Russia, and her works were partially translated into English, German, Italian, Bulgarian and Hungarian. The book «Without a Mask» mentioned in the novel was indeed published in Germany by Stella-Verlag publishing house.
Alexandra Kryuchkova is a three-time winner of the League of Writers of Eurasia «Literary Olympus» in the prose category, including the novel «A Guardian Angel» (2014), but a special role in her creative destiny was played by poets Evgeny Borisovich Rein and Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva. It’s no coincidence that in her acknowledgements, she mentions E. B. Rein first. The novel is also dedicated to A. Akhmatova and A. Blok. At the same time, E.B. Rein is a real character of the novel, while Tsvetaeva, Akhmatova and Blok help the main character from a parallel world by meeting her in the Library of the Universe.