Keneally’s The People’s Train

It’s not as if he needs it but I’ll give a plug to Thomas Keneally’s new novel The People’s Train. Sometimes it seems that just about every Russian between 1917 and the 1930s at some point passed through Shanghai – the memoirs and references to them are legion in the literature and history of Shanghai. Usually they’re White Russians on the run from the Bolsheviks.

In Keneally’s new novel he has a revolutionary escaping Tsarist Russia and making the long journey from Russia to Brisbane (apparently quite a few Russians ended up there) via China and Shanghai. It’s a brief mention but the whole novel is well worth reading if you like well researched historical fiction. Keneally bases most of his characters of real people and real events including a fascinating look at the Brisbane tram system (at least fascinating if, like me, you’re into trams).

Anyway, here’s the publisher’s blurb to give you more of an idea:

‘Artem Samsurov, a protégé of Lenin, makes an extraordinary escape from Tsarist Russia to reach sanctuary in Australia, but soon discovers that repression and injustice exist there too. Though distracted by an infatuation with a beautiful female lawyer, he throws himself back into the socialist cause, only to be imprisoned, then accused of murdering an informer. But he never loses his belief that the revolution will come – and in 1917, he returns to Russia alongside an Australian journalist to fight for it.

Based on a true story, Keneally’s enthralling novel takes us to the heart of the Russian Revolution through the dramatic exploits of one inspiring man. Once again, he illuminates a seismic period of history from an intimate, unusual perspective as he captures the ideals and passions behind a movement that changed the world.’