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by Paul Weinzweig (Editor), Paulina Zelitsky (Author)
This is a particularly timely memoir that addresses historical events repeating themselves today. The world is on the verge of a new Caribbean crisis, and Russian military aggression continues in Ukraine. It is a story of an orphan girl growing up in the Ukrainian city of Odesa in the Soviet Union, and her struggle for freedom against the Soviet KGB in Ukraine and later in Cuba.
Standing at the crossroads of autobiography and contemporary history, Paulina's memoir presents an intimate and bittersweet portrait of the coming of age of a fiercely independent girl, raised by her father, a former sea captain. At the age of two, Paulina lost her mother in 1947 in the lesser-known third starvation Holodomor, imposed by Stalin in southern Ukraine. Paulina's tender and loving relationship with her father served as her guide through the dangerous and dark period of Soviet history. Interwoven with her childhood narrative of a streetwise kid, deftly dodging the suffocating strictures of Communist tyranny, is a Cold War thriller arising from Paulina's involvement with a top-secret Soviet submarine base in Cuba, the indignity of attempted rape, the relentless pressure from the KGB to become their informer, and her desperate plans of escape to freedom. The Soviet base in Cienfuegos was home to a fleet of Soviet nuclear subs armed with cruise missiles equipped with nuclear warheads aimed at America. Concealed from the Western public and hidden beneath the ocean, this Soviet submarine base served as a major nuclear-armed missile platform in the backyard of the United States where it operated secretly and in defiance of international treaties for over 20 consecutive years, but the domestic political considerations during the Vietnam War kept the US Government silent until Russia closed it in 1992. The secret second Soviet Navy nuclear adventure threatening a confrontation with the United States dramatically affected the lives of Paulina, her husband, and their two small children. Paulina's memoir describes how and why she was co-opted to work as a translator for a top-secret project building a naval base in Cuba for Soviet submarines equipped with nuclear warhead missiles, camouflaged as a new civil cargo port in Cienfuegos. This is an emotional, suspenseful, and vivid tale about the virus of despotic oppression, the wars of disinformation, the perils of the Soviet security agencies, the protective love of a wise father for his daughter, and the bravery and good fortune of a young mother with two small children.Author Biography
Paulina is a Canadian Professional Engineer with extensive international experience in security, transportation and energy sectors. She obtained her initial M. Eng. degree in Coastal Marine Engineering from National Marine University in Odessa, Ukraine; and in 1976 she graduated in Permafrost Engineering at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Paulina started her career as a port designer for Soviet, Cuban and later in the 70s for private Canadian engineering companies across Canada. After Paulina's naturalization and certification as a Canadian Professional Engineer, she jump started her new career in Arctic Engineering in the energy sector, initially with the Northern Canada Power Commission in Edmonton and later with Petro-Canada as a Systems Engineer and with Ports Canada as a Program Manager. From 1984 Paulina served as a Safety and Risk Analysis Engineer at EMR COGLA in Ottawa and the National Energy Board (NEB), where she participated in the development of Canadian Onshore Pipeline Regulations and Canadian Diving Regulations. She is the Author and Publisher of several books available on her Amazon Author Page: http: //www.amazon.com/Paulina-Zelitsky/e/B00GF2CCFI
