Sovietistan: A Journey Through Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan

[A] mesmerising trip across central Asia . . . All credit to Erika Fatland, who may have titled her central Asian travelogue Sovietistan, but who treats each with care and attention. Part diary, part sociopolitical analysis . . . A fascinating travelogue
This talented narrator has compiled a book of timeless stories. Social anthropologist Erika Fatland has intertwined her encounters with well-researched digressions in history, politics and geography.
Engaging . . . The reader learns a lot about all kinds of subjects.
With her acute journalistic eye, clarity of style and not least a solid background in social anthropology, Erika Fatland has given us a number of astute books on complicated subjects. When this ability is combined with courage and a sense of adventure, the result is impressive
Now to be numbered among the best travel writers, the brilliant and intrepid Norwegian Erika Fatland has observed deserts, villages, metropolises and mountains to bring back a jewel of a story of adventure, intermingled histories, geography, geology, culture and politics.
Even if you're not currently planning a trip to Central Asia, this book will change your mind
A road trip dotted with curious incidents, thought-provoking observations and absurd stories, from culinary disasters to snapshots of everyday life under a dictatorship. A fine mingling of facts and the observations of a true travel writer
Fatland really knows her subject and writes with conviction. After her thoughtful writing on Beslan and the massacre on Utøya, there was every reason to have huge expectations. They have been more than fulfilled.
In Sovietistan, Erika Fatland has created a dense, polyphonic mosaic that shows five young states at the crossroads
This is another Asia visited by the Norwegian Erika Fatland . . . countries of contrasts, of extreme wealth and the madness of dictators who build white marble cities in the desert
Reminiscent of Ryszard Kapuscinski's The Shadow of the Sun, Sovietistan blends complex history with Fatland's own clear-eyed reporting, the devastation of the Soviet era always in the background (and sometimes the foreground)
An introduction to a deeply misunderstood part of the world...the complexity and beauty of this region are best represented when she goes back in time. Fatland has a level of access most outsiders would never have.

Erika Fatland studied Social Anthropology at the University of Oslo. Her 2011 book, The Village of Angels, was an in situ report on the Beslan terror attacks of 2004 and she is also the author of The Year Without Summer, describing the harrowing year that followed the massacre on Utøya in 2011. For Sovietistan (2019) she was shortlisted for the Edward Stanford/Lonely Planet Debut Travel Writer of the Year, and The Border (2020) was shortlisted for the Stanfords Dolman Travel Book of the Year 2020. Both are available from Pegasus Books. She speaks eight languages and lives in Oslo with her husband.