Blue Lard (Russian: Голубое сало, romanized: Goluboe salo) is a postmodern novel by Russian writer Vladimir Sorokin. It was first published in 1999 by Ad Marginem.
 Cover of the 2024 English edition by NYRB | |
| Author | Vladimir Sorokin |
|---|---|
| Original title | Голубое сало |
| Translator | Max Lawton |
| Language | Russian |
| Genre | Novel, Postmodern fiction, Dystopian fiction |
| Publisher | Ad Marginem (Russian), NYRB (English) |
Publication date | 1999 |
| Publication place | Russia |
Published in English | 2024 |
Plot
The plot of the book revolves around a substance called "blue lard" that the clones of Russian writers produce when they write[1] which is then used to power a hidden reactor on the moon.[2] Some of the cloned Russian writers include Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Akhmatova, Chekhov and Nabokov.[2] The novel takes place in two timelines: the second half of the 21st century (set in Siberia and Moscow in the future) and an alternative timeline of 1954 (in Joseph Stalin's Moscow and Adolf Hitler's Third Reich).