The Yellow Arrow

In the stories of Vikor Pelevin, one of the most original authors of contemporary Russian literature, nothing is what we first think - and the two longer stories in Helikon Pocket Books, part 83, are no exception. The location of Yellow Arrow at first gives the impression of a crowded apartment building, until our hero realizes that he is actually living on an endless train full of unconscious passengers that never stops. No one knows where the locomotive that encompasses the whole of Russia is going - the question is whether it can be disembarked before it reaches its final destination. At the beginning, we also know little about the mysterious title characters of Remete and Hatujjú, apart from the fact that they try to understand their increasingly sinister environment - which is really nothing more than a poultry farm, from where the path of our winged philosophers will most likely only lead to the plate, unless they succeed in time decipher the fatal nature of their world. In both stories, the very thought-provoking question unfolds along the lines of great ideas and dark humor: is there a way out of our homely prisons, can we escape from the ultimate illusion called "reality"?