Life and Fate
Very good. Not nearly as long as it seems. One of the best novels Ive read. I will read more of Vasily Grossman. (A lot of the action happens off stage.)
"It is not man that is impotent in the struggle against evil, but the power of evil that is impotent in the struggle against man. The powerlessness of kindness, of senseless kindness, is the secret of its immortality. … This dumb blind love is mans' meaning. … Human history is a battle fought by a great evil struggling to crush a small kernel of human kindness. But if what is human in human beings has not been destroyed even ow, then evil will never conquer."