Franta Louka is a concert cellist in Soviet-occupied Czechoslovakia, a confirmed bachelor and a lady's man. Having lost his place in the state orchestra, he must make ends meet by playing at funerals and painting tombstones. But he has run up a large debt, and when his friend, the grave-digger Mr. Broz, suggests a scheme for making a lot of money by marrying a Russian woman so that she can get her Czech papers, he reluctantly agrees. She takes advantage of the situation to emigrate to West Germany, to her lover; and leaves her five-year-old son with his grandmother; when the grandmother dies, Kolya must come and live with his stepfather - Louka. Written by Gary Dickerson {slug@mail.utexas.edu}
| Plot keywords | Amazon.com summary | User reviews |
| Trivia | Goofs | External reviews |
| Main details | MoKA: keyword discovery | Search plots section |
| Browse titles with plot summaries by letter A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z Other | ||