Metalwork on the stairs of the national scientific and technical archive in Ukraine.

I wrote this humorous short story in 2022, when there were fears Ukraine would be nuked on May 9, and there was a need for some lightness and hope. open.substack.com/pub/vika4goo...

Nutria on the Lopan River in Kharkiv.

My grandpa Viktor was very young when WW2 began. He had several birthdays because he added a year to join the red army in 1943 (provision was much better and he could send his relatives some food, he would say). He was a paramedic and I think he didn’t see much of the fighting, or 1/4

Library copies of my PhD submitted 🥳🥹. I still need to wait for all the checks, but, fingers crossed, the uni gods confirm. “Apocalyptic Unlearning: Vulnerable Legacies and Cultural Reimaginings in Wartime Kharkiv (2022-24)” will fly into the big world of grownup PhDs✈️.

A new episode of Films and Books with Kharkiv Cats. We never stay away from trends, and we’ve heard Tuapse is trending 😉. open.substack.com/pub/vika4goo...

The beautiful old town of Bohodukhiv - “town of god’s spirit” - is being relentlessly bombed for several days by the Russian military. It is here that a famous Ukrainian writer Mykola Khvylovyi studied. The terror by shaheeds, bombs and drones is relentless, erasing everything.

Wrote a short essay on the battle for memory and culture in “Donbas”. With a salt - present of my dear @victoriadonovan.bsky.social in 2021. substack.com/@vika4good/n...

After the night of drone and missile attacks I feel like a little plastic lamb in the Kharkiv Central Park. But the day is busy. I need to run for a training, then deadlines, and if the weather doesn’t curse us, an expedition.

Starting the most unique book for breakfast - a non-fiction story by two ethnographers in Izyum about Otaman Savonov, a Ukrainian who in 1918-1921 was fighting against both white russians and bolsheviks in Izyum. There is a chapter dedicated to him being “kharakternyk”, i.e. a Witcher 👀.

Russian state is consistently attacking cultural heritage of Ukraine. The 1835 Donets-Zakharzhevsky mansion survived two world wars, but not today’s russia. Colonel Donets was a Ukrainian Cossack settler in the 17th century Sloboda Ukraine. His family would become rich in centuries to come.

A small love song to the chalk fortress of Izyum and the way local are addressing the wounds of occupation. open.substack.com/pub/vika4goo...

Dear all, for my birthday under the sounds of Shaheeds I’m fundraising for some important equipment, to join one of my favourite Kharkiv initiatives. Today you have a chance to win my book! Links to the fundraiser in comments! 👇👇

In the times when russian state agents return to cultural institutions across the world, it’s time to stand up against the injustice. Please sign and spread the word about the petition: c.org/SwJdbnCQ4n

Love early morning walks through the city. Assumption Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Kharkiv on Gogol street. It is the main Catholic Church in Kharkiv.

I couldn’t help but analyze the russian gaze and the obsessive compulsion of russian intellectuals to write about Ukraine: open.substack.com/pub/vika4goo...

Woke up perfectly in time to hear a combined attack of russian missiles, shaheeds and m.gessens on Kharkiv.

My awkward translation of a poem by Anatolii Kytchynskyi, a poet from Kherson, The Cold of That Winter (2005). We called the cold of that winter “beastly”, Because it was so freezing you could bark. But language would save us. There was a feeling That all the colds in the universe👇

Starting this day in Kharkiv with a class of fly yoga was definitely a choice 😅. As we were swinging in hammocks after the threat of guided bombs subsided, the instructor asked if anyone watched the new adaptation of the Wuthering Heights already.

Happy pancake holiday. In Ukraine, it’s called either masliana (Масляна) or Kolodyi (Колодій). My kitchen is warm enough to cook again! Tried to make crepe suzette. Let’s burn the scarecrow of winter and approach spring.

This Kharkiv cat is a lightning, a Sunday messenger.

There is nothing like taking a relaxing hot bath in a cold ass winter apartment, and hearing a female voice from a street loudspeaker “attention, attention, missile threat, missile threat” 💀

It’s 0C outside, and I don’t see clouds of my breath in the apartment anymore🥳. Celebrated with some oven baked oatmeal with leftover barbecue meat. And my love - regional paper Slobidsky Kraj. “Sloboda” was a free settlement of Ukrainians in 17th century.

Update on my Kharkiv flowers. Banana is not doing well. It’s +7 inside, can see my breath. Today the new heater has to arrive 🙏.

Breakfast in candlelight, watching Super Bowl halftime show using WiFi from a cafe on generator downstairs.

1,5 kilo of Kharkiv cake for breakfast.

“Don’t touch, sleeping till spring” - a plant in the hallway of Kharkiv School of Architecture says (now based in Lviv). I wish I could say that too.

An old orchid in my apartment is trying to bloom in -20 relying on a cold radiator it stands on. The way strength is born out of care, and violence out of great weakness of the criminal and indifference of the surrounding world.

Kharkiv groundhog Tymko IV predicted six more weeks of winter. Thanks for nothing, Tymko. We see you’re also embarrassed.

In -20 russian military purposefully destroyed the last energy facilities of Kharkiv. The attack lasted all through the night. Horrible cold, inhuman cruelty. Remember that when russian people will be crying in the court of justice how they were just following orders. They knew. They always knew.

There is nothing more nerve-racking than reading in the news that your district was hit by a russian missile, that a school and a kindergarten nearby got hit, and knowing there is a school and a kindergarten nearby your parents’ house. Driving there with your heart shooting through your lungs 👇

Weekend my the Saltivka forest in Kharkiv. As russian drones hit residential homes, people play hockey on frozen water.

To sweeten the desperate cold of winter the famous Kharkiv cake is on discount in my supermarket. 😅

25 Shaheed drones hit my district overnight in Kharkiv. It’s strange but I always feel when they target civilians specifically. Everything sounds differently. I was born in the maternity hospital that was hit. I can’t sleep and can’t wake up. They do this on weekends so that people didn’t rest.

My friends who went to get water under russian bombs, then fled and found a job in a month in a foreign country had an office colleague who would tell her they are dating a russian soldier on tinder and laugh. Imagine laughing at the victims of violence. And we don’t need to imagine.

Modernist 1960s cafe Krystal in Kharkiv, was renovated in 2020. The problem with the renovation as you see are the pines that were enclosed in concrete and died. The cafe is famous for the Bilochka (squirrel) icecream - thick cream dessert with chocolate and lots of hazelnuts.

Palm tree that survived ww1 and ww2 in Kharkiv botanical garden. The greenhouse suffered from russian attack in 2022, and the tree for the first time was threatened. Now the garden is fragile as ever, as most of the homes are barely heated after continuous attacks.

David Lynch kind of days.

Derzhprom, my modernist love on an evening walk in a winter Kharkiv.

Check out one of our 2025 Nonfiction Selections, "What to do with all the Russion Books" by @brams884.bsky.social (Fiery Scribe Review) selected by Jen Soriano on bestofthenetanthology.com/2025-2/2025-nonfiction/what-to-do-with-all-the-russian-books/ #bestofthenetanthology #nonfictionwriting

This Kharkiv cat wishes all an adventurous Tuesday.

“Someone who could sit here is now in russian captivity”, - a sign on the bench along the Lopan river in Kharkiv.

Dear all, the first session in the Cities at War Lecture Series in 2026 will be given by Viktoriia Grivina on "Kharkiv is a Dream. Planning a Future During War". Join her timely talk on Wednesday, 07.01.2026 at 4 pm CET. register here -> lnkd.in/eSVGc5wD

My friend mending her artwork while 5 russian missiles hit the city in the distance. @kharkivisadream.bsky.social

Kharkiv pedagogic university decorated for the holidays. Hryhorii Skovoroda, baroque Ukrainian philosopher also got an image update.

Kharkiv snowperson reflecting my emotional state.

My dear Kharkiv Tractor Factory hood. 1930s-1940s were militant years for Soviet architects, even little windows in the hallways resemble medieval fortress loopholes.

Unique modernist neighbourhood in central Kharkiv hit by two russian missiles. From the early 20th century buildings with elements of Art Deco to 1920-30s constructivism, this is European architectural legacy destroyed along 16 injured lives.

My Christmas tree in Kharkiv. Even in this hellish year I couldn’t help running down the street to a tiny Christmas tree market and decorating my crooked little tree that nobody else wanted to take 😅.