In this continuation of Anna Karenina's legacy, Russia simmers on the brink of change and the stories that have long been kept secret finally come to light.

Saint Petersburg, 1905. Behind the gates of the Karenin Palace, Sergei, son of Anna Karenina, meets Tolstoy in his dreams and finds reminders of his mother everywhere: the vivid portrait that the tsar intends to acquire and the opium-infused manuscripts Anna wrote just before her death, which open a trapdoor to a wild feminist fairy tale. Across the city, Clementine, an anarchist seamstress, and Father Gapon, the charismatic leader of the proletariat, plan protests that embroil the downstairs members of the Karenin household in their plots and tip the country ever closer to revolution. Boullosa tells a polyphonic and subversive tale of the Russian revolution through the lens of Tolstoy's most beloved work.

Carmen Boullosa-a Cullman Center, a Guggenheim, a DAAD and a FONCA Fellow-was born in Mexico City in 1954. She's a poet, playwright, essayist, novelist, and artist, and has been a professor at NYU, Columbia University, City College CUNY, Georgetown, and other institutions. She's now at Macaulay Honors College CUNY. The NYPL acquired her papers and artist books. More than a dozen books and over ninety dissertations have been written about her work.

Russia, 1905. Behind the gates of the Karenin Palace, Sergei, son of Anna Karenina, meets Tolstoy in his dreams and finds reminders of his mother everywhere: the almost-living portrait that the Tsar intends to acquire and the opium-infused manuscripts she wrote just before her death, one of which opens a trapdoor to a wild feminist fairytale. Across the city, Clementine, an anarchist seamstress, and Father Gapón, the charismatic leader of the proletariat, tip the country ever closer to revolution. Boullosa lifts the voices of coachmen, sailors, maids, and seamstresses in this playful, polyphonic, and subversive revision of the Russian revolution, told through the lens of Tolstoy's most beloved work.