Those who wish to bear witness to Ukrainians enduring the Russian invasion that began in February 2022 should turn to Danielle Leavitt's moving and poignant By the Second Spring: Seven Lives and One Year of the War in Ukraine. Leavitt, who has a PhD in history from Harvard University, creates a nuanced--and often devastating--portrait of life in Ukraine under the Russian siege. Motivated by the urge to depict Ukrainians beyond the popular portrayals of "desperate victims or nearly superhuman heroes," Leavitt's work is deeply felt; her humanistic approach brings "names, faces, personality, and identity to the often anonymous Ukrainians."
The seven people profiled vary in age, ethnic identity, class, and location. They are Anna, Maria, Polina, Tania, Vitaly, Volodymyr, and Yulia, and Leavitt introduces them within family and historical contexts, mingling history with the personal and creating dynamic storytelling. With Vitaly, for example, Leavitt succinctly summarizes his father's work for the Soviet housing administration and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union, then relates the origins of Ukrainian statehood and the myth of the Cossack. Through Maria's introduction, readers learn about Ukraine's Revolution of Dignity, which happened when she was in high school. By Second Spring rotates through the seven people in each of the five parts, which track the seasons of the first year of the war. Readers follow the hopes, dreams, and even love stories of these people, which makes it all the more heartbreaking when the war fractures their lives. --Nina Semczuk, writer, editor, and illustrator