Wayne Vansant

A teenage girl's family is torn apart by the Nazi invasion of Ukraine and Russia in this big, thick chunk of historical fiction (over 500 pages!). Katusha and her adopted sister find themselves evading the Nazis, joining a resistance movement, and eventually becoming tank crew members in the Red Army. And yes, there really were a few dozen women who did serve on Soviet tanks during World War II, including tank commander Aleksandra Samusenko, whose life was probably a source of inspiration for this work.

Wayne Vansant's writing doesn't have the humor, drama, or visceral energy of Garth Ennis' tales of Russian female snipers and bomber pilots (see the excellent Sara and The Night Witches), but his dedication to the subject and commitment to authenticity shine through. Even when the narration gets bogged down in a bit too much detail or from veering off to visit minor cast members, it's easy to stay enthused about following the doe-eyed heroine through hell and back.

And war is indeed hell here, with soldiers and civilians dying often and brutally, frequently at the hands of their own comrades and countrymen, as people find themselves stuck between factions, between armies, and between nations, branded traitors to some cause no matter what choice they make.

The only things I found really objectionable though were the romance between the teenage sister and her fortysomething "uncle" and the world's most inappropriate hook-up as a young woman with a cleft lip has a meet-cute with a soldier who is moping around disappointed that the gang rape in which he hoped to lose his virginity was stopped. And then the story doubles down on that by having Katusha promise to introduce the woman to a blind man she knows after the war. Thankfully, these missteps are small parts of this epic adventure.

This omnibus collects the first two volumes in the series from 2013 as well as the previously unpublished concluding volume.… (más)