The Sunflower Boys

The Sunflower Boys / Sam Wachman
NY: Harper, c2025.
352 p.

This novel, published as YA, is by an American writer with Ukrainian roots. It follows two young boys, Artem and Yuri, as the full scale Russian invasion arrives in Feb 2022. Their father is working in American, sending money home, while their mother and grandfather take care of them. 

Artem is an artist, drawing in his sketchbook constantly. He is a regular boy, with school hijinks, games, friends and so on. But as this book opens, he is realizing that he is also falling in love with his best friend. This theme of identity and self-awareness runs throughout the book, but there are bigger things to worry about once Russia arrives. 

After the first few days of hiding in the basement with the rest of their apartment neighbours, their mother decides that they are leaving the city to go to their grandfather's farm in the country. This seems like a good plan but it turns out to be a tragic decision. There is a horrific scene when the Russians find the house; it was very graphic and terrible, and perhaps readers should be aware that there is violence and terror in this book as well. 

Artem and Yuri escape and make their way across a hellscape of cold, dark countryside, trying to get to a city so they can flee to Kyiv. Eventually they make it, their father finally gets back into Ukraine and finds them, and they end up in Florida in the last chapters. But this trek is endless, full of difficulty, fear, hunger - and also the help of people they find along the way. Artem and Yuri stick together but as the elder brother, Artem is more permanently affected by his responsibility and awareness of what's going on. 

This was a striking and realistic read, a war novel that describes the realities of civilians caught in the middle of this invasion. It's also a humanising one; Artem's life and other concerns are still important to him, everything is not wiped by war coming. It was a powerful read, but readers should be prepared for some traumatic scenes, as Wachman doesn't hold back on the horrors of war.