In the tradition of Gogol, with a Bulawayo’s GLORY-like twist, comes a rueful satire on modern-day Russia: one elephant’s epic journey towards the condemnation of war.

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Arriving on a barge from Istanbul to Kerch on March 1st, 2022, Bobo is the war elephant gifted by the Turkish sultan to the Russian Tsar. What awaits him is an arduous journey on foot across Russia on the way to Orenburg, where the Tsar is hiding in his bunker, sitting out an unsuccessful war. What also awaits Bobo is a rude awakening. 

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Travelling from city to village to town, meeting a cast of characters, Bobo – who expected to fall in love with his new homeland – gradually learns what contemporary Russia is really like, where its leader’s abuse of power has led it and what that means for its neighbour. After encountering unrelenting propaganda, police brutality, corruption, and miserable existence of the Tsar’s subjects, Bobo discovers who he truly is and what he wants to stand for once he shakes off the shackles of hopeful servitude. 

Written with sparkling wit, expertly weaving the child-like and the curious with frigid political reality, drawing on Russian history as well as the most recent news, BOBO is a bildungsroman and a powerful statement against the Russian regime and the war it unleashed on Ukraine.

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​Rights Sold:

Poland: Ursines