Soda machine with and without syrup

Uladzimir Nyaklyaev's novel "A soda machine with syrup and without" takes the reader to Minsk in the 1960s, where the history of a big city and small personal destinies intertwine into a single mosaic. Through the line for soda, through the faces of bohemians, dissidents and officers, through youthful love and poetry, the author shows Belarus at a turning point when the ideals of a generation were being formed. This is a social novel about the maturation of a person and society, about the search for oneself and one's country in the labyrinth of history.

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Uladzimir Nyaklyaev's novel "A soda machine with syrup and without" is a monumental work about (non)Soviet people, the (non)Soviet city of Minsk, and love that doesn't care. The author sees Belarus and Belarusians through the prism of a man who grew up in the 1960s.

“The soda machine was located on Volya Square, on the descent to Nyamiga, where it was moved from Lenin Avenue, from the store under the clock, the sixth grocery store, where they started selling sparkling water with and without syrup to Minsk residents.”

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The book “A soda machine with syrup and without” by Uladzimir Nyaklyaev is a social novel that, through microstories of Minsk bohemia, tells us about History with a capital letter. In this History, there are many faces standing together in line for soda: Lee Harvey Oswald and Kim Khadeyev, dissidents and G.E.B.s, survivors of World War II and cold front fighters, the one who reported and who was reported, and, of course, the one who is big, Soviet and concrete. The city in the novel is destroyed, gathered and shuffles place names. Minsk, to which history from the center of the red empire reaches late, lets through the youthful love and poetry of its participants.

“This is a novel about the coming of age of a person (and a generation), the formation of his (and a generation's) ideals. It is also a novel about the mysteries of youth, the solution to which lies 50 years later.”