In Piotr Wojciechowski’s novel anything can happen, or almost anything. A candidate for Tsar of Russia ends up as a chef at a Viennese restaurant. A female agent working for Polish intelligence who has trained for the role of future tsarina turns into a homeless dealer in Asian rip-offs of designer-label underwear. Demoted from an American military academy, a Polish officer ends up on a military scientific programme that aims to manipulate time and biology. A dead girl is brought back to life thanks to medical experiments… And those are just a few of the surprises Wojciechowski has in store in his lengthy novel, Wait for the New Moon. The basic plot belongs to the genre of political fiction. The action flings the main characters from one end of the world to the other and is set in the near future; the situation in Russia is getting more and more unstable, so the West, in cooperation with the United States, decides to intervene. The analysts come to the conclusion that the situation in the East can only be dealt with by restoring the monarchy. Then the intelligence operations and political games begin, and some more or less fantastical, more or less emergency solutions are planned. Two Poles, Michał and Ludka, who are the main characters in the novel, are mixed up in political espionage. They used to be a couple, but since they split up life has lost its joy and meaning. The book is not just a sensational variation on the theme of the world’s future and complicated relations between Poland and Russia, but perhaps primarily the story of young people who, despite being dragged into the merciless machinations of history, are looking for a purpose in life and some good old happiness. This book is a sort of “two for the price of one”, and will be enjoyed by the kind of compulsive readers for whom the priority is some lively action full of twists and turns, as well as those looking for something deeper in a novel.
- Robert Ostaszewski
Piotr Wojciechowski (born 1938) is a writer, journalist, screenwriter and film director. He lectures at the Higher Film School in Łódź and has written some books for children. He is always using pastiche and quotations, and deliberately combines a wide variety of styles.
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