Book Review - A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian (a novel)

Just finished an enjoyable and charming novel.  Thanks to Hannahbanana, who mentioned it in one of her posts.  The premise sounded so intriguing that I had to pick it up.

A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian

Marina Lewycka

Summary from the New Yorker - Two estranged sisters living in England discover that their addled elderly father, a Ukrainian war refugee and expert on tractors, is planning to marry a young, enormous-breasted woman who sees his modest pension as her ticket to capitalist comfort. The sisters put aside their differences, and embark on a spirited campaign to save him from boil-in-the-bag dinners, slovenly housekeeping, and such extravagant purchases as a broken-down Rolls-Royce. In the midst of these machinations—which include long-winded letters to solicitors, venomous gossip, and all-out spying—Lewycka stealthily reveals how the depredations of the past century dictate what a family can bear.

What starts as a humorous story about the narrator's father marrying a big-breasted young tart, blossoms into an authentic look at family dynamics, the sacrifices we make for one another, and the tie immigrants have to their "birth country".  I rode the emotional rollercoaster with the narrator, and felt very satisfied with the end.  Lewycka's characters are full-bodied, lovable (even the "villainess"), and remarkably real.

I'll leave you with the first three lines of the novel, which for me was the equivalent of "you had me at hello":
Two years after my mother died, my father fell in love with a glamorous blond Ukrainian divorcee.  He was eighty-four and she was thirty-six.  She exploded into our lives like a fluffy pink grenade, churning up the murky water, bringing to the surface a sludge of sloughed-off memories, giving the family ghosts a kick up the backside.