{"title":"Maria Alyokhina","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"riot-days-book-maria-alyokhina-9780241316429","title":"Riot Days","description":"From activist, Pussy Riot member and freedom fighter Maria Alyokhina,  a raw, hallucinatory, passionate account of her arrest, trial and  imprisonment in a penal colony in the Urals for standing up for what she  believed in.  'One of the most brilliant and inspiring things I've read in years. Couldn't put it down. This book is freedom' Chris Kraus, author of I Love Dick  'Reading: RIOT DAYS, by PussyRiot member MariaAlyokhina. A women's prison memoir like no other! One tough cookie!' @MargaretAtwood  'In oppressive political systems, some of the most effective weapons are sarcasm and dark humour. It is exactly these weapons that are employed by Masha Alyokhina in the brilliantly written Riot Days. Once you begin reading, you are completely disarmed, unable to put it down until the last page' Marina Abramovic  People who believe in freedom and democracy think it will exist forever.  That is a mistake. What happened in Russia - what happened to me - could happen anywhere.  When  I was jailed for political protest, I learned that prison doesn't just  teach you to follow the rules. It teaches you to think that you can  never break them.  It's inevitable that the prison gates will  open at some point. But this doesn't mean that you leave the 'prisoner'  category and go straight into the category of 'the free'.  Freedom does not exist unless you fight for it every day.  This is the story about how I made a choice.  We are all Pussy Riot. And actions break fear.   'To Back Down an Inch is to Give Up a Mile'.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49525032812817,"sku":"GOR008494958","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49646443233553,"sku":"GOR008815554","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50137619038481,"sku":"CIN0241316421G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50942846468369,"sku":"GOR011543837","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51503487811857,"sku":"GOR008537914","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0241316421.jpg?v=1751449177"},{"product_id":"riot-days-book-maria-alyokhina-9780141986616","title":"Riot Days","description":"From activist, Pussy Riot member and freedom fighter Maria Alyokhina, a raw, hallucinatory, passionate account of her arrest, trial and imprisonment in Siberian jail for standing up for what she believed in.  'One of the most brilliant and inspiring things I've read in years. Couldn't put it down. This book is freedom' Chris Kraus, author of I Love Dick  'A women's prison memoir like no other! One tough cookie!' @MargaretAtwood  'Once you begin reading, you are completely disarmed, unable to put it down until the last page' Marina Abramovic  People who believe in freedom and democracy think it will exist forever.  That is a mistake. What happened in Russia - what happened to me - could happen anywhere.  When  I was jailed for political protest, I learned that prison doesn't just  teach you to follow the rules. It teaches you to think that you can  never break them.  It's inevitable that the prison gates will  open at some point. But this doesn't mean that you leave the 'prisoner'  category and go straight into the category of 'the free'.  Freedom does not exist unless you fight for it every day.  This is the story about how I made a choice.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49544930984209,"sku":"GOR009322364","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49730131689745,"sku":"NGR9780141986616","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49960392818961,"sku":"GOR010015793","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50726626296081,"sku":"GOR009574932","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51317267005713,"sku":"GOR010999182","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0141986611.jpg?v=1751388993"},{"product_id":"velvet-terrorism-pussy-riot-s-russia-book-maria-alyokhina-9788793659735","title":"Velvet Terrorism: Pussy Riot's Russia","description":"Punk, humor, poetry and pure rage: the full story of Pussy Riot as told by the group’s members  The Russian art collective and activist group Pussy Riot, formed in Moscow in 2011, is famous for its spontaneous and courageous actions challenging the Russian regime. Edited by Maria (Masha) Alyokhina, member and cofounder of the feminist-activist performance collective, this volume compiles, in chronological order, the last decade-plus of Pussy Riot’s happenings in Russia. Recurrent themes in the group’s feminist, anti-Putin practice include freedom of expression, human rights, LGBTQ+ rights and the release of political prisoners, while recent actions and works feature anti-war statements and support for Ukraine. Accompanying the eponymous traveling exhibition—the group’s largest presentation of work to date and its first-ever museum show—it is bolstered by a vast selection of photos and video stills, as well as personal accounts from the group’s members. In addition to documenting the performances themselves, the catalog chronicles the consequences of these nonviolent public actions for those who took part: these include arrests, beatings, imprisonment, poisoning, surveillance and house arrest. In addition to the iconic performances, such as Punk Prayer (2012), the exhibition catalog also documents a wide range of lesser-known actions as well as the escape from Russia of some of Pussy Riot’s key members in 2022. Told from the perspective of the Pussy Riot activists themselves, the exhibition and accompanying catalog provide a critical and timely insight into the evolution of Putin’s Russia over the past 10 years, including the military invasion of Ukraine.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49751202169105,"sku":"NGR9788793659735","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51066363576593,"sku":"NIN9788793659735","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52332943507729,"sku":"NLS9788793659735","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":52505076859153,"sku":"CIN8793659733VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52719088304401,"sku":"GOR014596559","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/8793659733.jpg?v=1751318943"},{"product_id":"riot-days-book-maria-alyokhina-9781250164926","title":"Riot Days","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA Pussy Rioter's riveting, hallucinatory account of her years in Russia's criminal system and of finding power in the most powerless of situations\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn February 2012, after smuggling an electric guitar into Moscow's iconic central cathedral, Maria Alyokhina and other members of the radical collective Pussy Riot performed a provocative Punk Prayer, taking on the Orthodox church and its support for Vladimir Putin's authoritarian regime.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor this, they were charged with organized hooliganism and were tried while confined in a cage and guarded by Rottweilers. That trial and Alyokhina's subsequent imprisonment became an international cause. For Alyokhina, her two-year sentence launched a bitter struggle against the Russian prison system and an iron-willed refusal to be deprived of her humanity. Teeming with protests and police, witnesses and cellmates, informers and interrogators, \u003ci\u003eRiot Days\u003c\/i\u003e gives voice to Alyokhina's insistence on the right to say no, whether to a prison guard or to the president. Ultimately, this insistence delivers unprecedented victories for prisoners' rights.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEvocative, wry, laser-sharp, and laconically funny, Alyokhina's account is studded with song lyrics, legal transcripts, and excerpts from her jail diary--dispatches from a young woman who has faced tyranny and returned with the proof that against all odds even one person can force its retreat.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50797616660753,"sku":"CIN1250164923G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":53412578918673,"sku":"CIN1250164923A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1250164923.jpg?v=1751017532"},{"product_id":"political-girl-book-maria-alyokhina-9780241670118","title":"Political Girl","description":"'Witty, urgent, and unflinching... her story speaks to anyone who believes that protest can be art, and that art can confront, disrupt, and even destabilize authoritarian power' Alpa Shah  What can you do when your country becomes a repressive authoritarian state?     2014: Russia prepares to host the Winter Olympics. Russia invades Crimea. Putin is re-elected president. Several political prisoners are amnestied and released early from prison.  Maria Alyokhina is among them. She had spent two years in a penal colony after performing the punk prayer ‘Virgin Mary, Banish Putin’ with her friends in the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. They had warned the rest of the world of the dangers of authoritarianism, but the Russia she finds when she gets out of prison is even more oppressive.  What can you do, she asks, when your country has been seized by all-powerful men who are waging war against another country and their own citizens?  As Maria recounts her brave and colourful protests, we are drawn straight into the world of grassroots opposition and witness the absurd measures the Russian state takes to contain protest. And when the full-scale war against Ukraine starts and the Russian opposition is repeatedly silenced, Maria and her activist friends continue to resist despite the high stakes. They fight increasingly absurd cycles of detention and house arrest: sometimes with the smallest acts such as going for a walk or having a rainbow ice cream, until, faced with a new prison sentence, she escapes Russia in May 2022 dressed as a food delivery courier.  Her story, like her life, is fiercely courageous, darkly funny and highly inspiring to anyone who wants to stand up for the truth.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51596137267473,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":51596137922833,"sku":"NGR9780241670118","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52653519896849,"sku":"GOR014577555","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52657538367761,"sku":"NLS9780241670118","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52774214271249,"sku":"GOR014616765","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/024167011X.jpg?v=1767349912"},{"product_id":"political-girl-book-maria-alyokhina-9780807024287","title":"Political Girl","description":"\u003cb\u003eFrom a member of the Pussy Riot collective: An urgent, intimate, firsthand account of grassroots dissent, bravery, art, and spectacle in Putin's Russia\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Picking up where \u003ci\u003eRiot Days\u003c\/i\u003e left off, Maria (Masha) Alyokhina takes us through her activist experiences between 2014 to 2022. In vivid, diary-like vignettes, we follow her as she goes in and out of Russian prisons, continually dodges police violence, protests at the Sochi Olympics, flies to Kyiv to stand in solidarity with Ukraine, defends the high-level dissident Alexi Navalny, drops banners at Trump Tower, and--in 2022--flees from Russia in disguise to escape a new prison sentence.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Spanning settings from Moscow to London to New York to Harvard\u003ci\u003e, Political Girl\u003c\/i\u003e has an artistic sensibility, a punk ethos, a deep moral clarity, and an inimitably dry Russian wit. It portrays not only Masha's political activities but also her personal arc: the friends she makes in prison, the woman she falls in love with, her bond with her young son Filip, and her deep passion for art and history. As Trump attempts to bring Putin-style authoritarianism to the U.S., Masha's message to Americans is one of solidarity and hope.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52782797816081,"sku":null,"price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52782797848849,"sku":"NIN9780807024287","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9780807024287.jpg?v=1764037237"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-maria-alyokhina.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}