Undefeatable

‘Julian Evans' deeply felt memoir of an Englishman’s experiences in Ukraine over half a lifetime, wry, unsparing and lyrical, is scattered with bright evocations of a country striving, against the odds, to be’

– James Meek

‘Macabre, surreal, haunting, beautifully observed and darkly moving’

– Rory Stewart

‘This is an important book, not just an eyewitness account of a country besieged, but a chronicle of the war, with helpful background both literary and political. Its great achievement is presenting its human face – resolute and heroic’

– Paul Theroux

‘Julian Evans’ love letter to Odesa is as beguiling as the city itself. In lyrical prose he interweaves history and literature with an account of his three-decades long relationship with the city, mounting a passionate defence of Ukraine as it faces down Russia's imperial aggression’

– Lindsey Hilsum

‘Should be required reading. Undefeatable is simultaneously a work of literary art (it is beautifully written) and a superb introduction to what is happening in Ukraine now’

– Carlo Gébler

‘A beautiful portrait of a city and a nation in a time of peril’

– James Buchan

‘A shimmering Black Sea tapestry’

– Nicholas Shakespeare

‘This is the account we've been starved of: an insight into Ukraine from an authoritative British writer who has skin in the country’s game. “Odesa is my discovered heart,” confesses Julian Evans, who fell in love with a woman from this constantly beguiling Black Sea port and started a family there, “the place that's given me what I need for more than twenty-five years.” An outsider turned insider, his deep personal involvement compelled him to the front line of an unprovoked war without precedent in Europe for nearly eighty years. His vivid first-hand reportage shows how Odesa’s story is inseparable from Ukraine’s – and more than that, how it has become our story too’

– Nicholas Shakespeare

‘Undefeatable is an absolutely fascinating and absorbing memoir of one writer’s relationship with a city and its people. Powerful, cogent, humane and scarifying – Julian Evans has written a modern classic’

– William Boyd

‘Wry, unsparing and lyrical; scattered with bright evocations of a country striving, against the odds, to be’

– James Meek

A vivid snapshot of a wretched situation

* The Independe