Another Ukrainian writer is killed at the front
On 2 July, Andrii Hudyma, a restaurateur and executive chef from the western city of Lviv, was killed in battle near Bakhmut in Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast. The news was reported by his colleagues from the Re:bro restaurant and the Staryi Lev Publishing House, which is set to publish Andrii’s book 69 Spices for the Soul very soon.
"Andrii Hudyma has become part of the Staryi Lev family. The publishing house is preparing Andrii’s incredible, ironic and profound book 69 Spices for the Soul, illustrated by Svitlana Fesenko, for publication. This is an irreparable and terrible loss for us all. May he rest in peace, and glory to the hero!" the Staryi Lev Publishing House wrote.
Mariana Savka, founder of the publishing house, expressed her condolences as well: "Our author, who did not live to see his own book, has died at the front. At the Arsenal Book Festival, Svitlana Fesenko and I were looking through her watercolour illustrations for this incredible book about spices. There is so much love and zest for life in it. It will be a beautiful book, Andrii, I promise. It’s so painful to be a publisher of books whose authors will never see them in print."
Illustrator Svitlana Fesenko said that she and Andrii had time to discuss the concept of the cover and drawings for the book: "A few months ago, the Old Lion Publishing House once again involved me in a wonderful project – to illustrate a book about spices. A bright, witty, fun, tasty book about spices. About life. Unfortunately, life never knows when death will come... But there will be a book. I am drawing it. Now as a memory book about Andrii. I am drawing a celebration of life. In every sense."
The farewell ceremony will be held on Thursday, 6 July, at 11:00 in Saints Peter and Paul Garrison Church in Lviv.
The day before, on 5 July, a ceremony to bid farewell to another writer, Victoria Amelina, will be held in the same church. Amelina died as a result of the missile attack on a pizzeria in Kramatorsk on 27 June. Her books, Dom’s Dream Kingdom, a novel, and two children’s books, Storie-e-es of Eka the Excavator and Somebody, or Waterheart, were published by Staryi Lev.
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