Leo Vardiashvili
Set in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia, two years after the occupation of South Ossetia by Russia in 2008, Hard by a Great Forest follows the fortunes of a father and sons who, having fled the conflict for asylum in western Europe, must return to their decaying but still beautiful homeland to rescue each other and make peace with the past. By turns savage and tender, compassionate and harrowing, it is a powerful but ultimately hopeful novel about the individual and collective trauma of war. It publishes in January 2024.
Leo Vardiashvili came to the United Kingdom with his family as a refugee from Georgia when he was thirteen years old. He studied English Literature at Queen Mary College, University of London and now works in the financial sector. He is in his early forties and this is his first novel. Rights for Hard by a Great Forest have sold in major deals to Bloomsbury UK and the Riverhead imprint of Penguin Random House in the US Hard by a Great Forest has also sold in Germany, Holland, Italy, Romania, Brazil, Sweden, Hungary, Poland, Lithuania, France, Finland and Spanish World Rights.
Praise for Hard by a Great Forest
"This novel annihilated me. I gasped, laughed, and wept my way through it. Rich with irony and animated with astonishing humanity, this tale of a young Georgian refugee’s odyssey into his birthplace to rescue family left my heart bruised and battered and aching for more. " Khalid Hosseini
Photo Credit: Kiera Fyles, Palmer Photography
