City of thieves, by David Benioff

OK, you say, a comic novel about the Siege of Leningrad?  Well, yes, in parts.  The author has written the screenplays for such well-known titles as Kiterunner and Game of Thrones, and one can certainly see this being made into a movie without too much rewriting.  It’s a buddy film in a way.  Lev Beniov, a 17 year old Jew who has remained behind to defend the city after his mother and sister flee to safer areas, is arrested after looting the body of a dead German paratrooper.  In the same cell is a hulking, handsome Cossack soldier named Kolya, who is accused of desertion.  Brought before the Soviet colonel, instead of being shot, they are offered their freedom if they can find a dozen eggs in the starved city in time to bake a cake for the colonel’s daughter’s wedding later that week.  Sneaking behind enemy lines, they follow rumors of where such an unlikely treasure can be found and fall in with partisans in the countryside.  One of them, disguised as a young boy, is a girl who is an expert sharpshooter.  At times horrifying, the story still has a thread of the survival of good people in the face of evil.  Given the frame tale (that it is the author's retelling of the reminiscences of the his grandfather), and the name similarities, one has to wonder if there is an autobiographical aspect. 258 pp.