The book “INSIDE UKRAINE. A Portrait of a Country and its People” headed the top sales on Amazon

The English-language version of the book “INSIDE UKRAINE. A Portrait of a Country and its People”, which was announced on January 16 by the British publishing house Batsford, topped the Amazon sales chart in the Hot New Releases in History of Ukraine category.

“It is a compelling visual portrait of the real Ukraine, lovingly put together by Ukrainians in the years leading up to the current war. The product of five years and 100,000km of travel around the country by the volunteers of Ukraïner, an organisation that aims to explain Ukraine to its inhabitants and promote it to the wider world, this unique book is a beautiful celebration of the land and its people. It captures the true variety of this vast country, the second largest in Europe, from picturesque forest villages to large urban housing projects, stunning mountain and estuarine scenery to industrial quarries and medieval fortresses. It introduces the people of Ukraine and their stories, with a huge cast of characters including traditional carol singers, wild honey farmers, potters and railwaymen, artists and sheep-breeders and broom-makers,” Batsford’s website says.

The publication will contain over 350 photos and QR codes leading to longreads on Ukraïner’s website.

British publisher Polly Powell commented: “This book came into my hands as a gift from the Ukrainian family I was hosting in London. It, along with the mother and two girls, had travelled 30 hours to get to us, via a bus, a train journey to the Polish border and then a flight from Krakow. They didn’t know I was a book publisher and my immediate interest was a surprise to them. It was obvious both that they needed to sleep, and that the book needed to be published in the English-speaking world. It was written before the war and it is a wonderful portrait of what it means to be Ukrainian.”

In an exclusive commentary to Chytomo, Yevheniia Sapozhnykova, Ukraïner’s editor-in-chief of text formats, said that interest in buying the rights to Ukraïner books has generally increased, particularly after the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2022, where the publications were presented at the Ukrainian stand.

“This publication is a collection of stories about people from all regions of Ukraine who are creating our country, “writing” its modern history with their social initiatives, business startups, cultural projects, inventions, exploring antiquity and preserving traditions. I think that this is one of the first such complex multimedia book publications (in addition to textual stories, the book contains many photos, as well as QR codes for our videos and longreads) about Ukraine, its natural resources (national parks, nature reserves, etc.), and the people who live here. From the very beginning, we intended this book to represent Ukraine in the world, to provide more information to foreigners about how interesting and worth visiting our country is. Of course, now, in the context of a full-scale invasion, the interest in Ukraine has increased significantly, and the demand for such publications is also much higher,” she said.

“INSIDE UKRAINE. A Portrait of a Country and its People” is a book based on the first round of a large-scale expedition across Ukraine, which lasted from summer 2016 to winter 2018 and covered all historical regions — from Slobozhanshchyna to Podillia, from Volyn to Tavria. The project was initiated by Bohdan Lohvynenko.

You can pre-order the book here. It costs £25.00.

Read also: What to bring from Ukraine: 10 books that will be a wonderful gift

Photo: batsfordbooks.com