ABOUT
THE BOOK

Pyotr Voyd, a leading St. Petersburg poet, unexpectedly finds himself commissar to the legendary commander Chapaev and his formidable machine-gunner sidekick, Anna, in the 1919 Civil War. But what is the secret of her machine-gun? Why does Pyotr keep waking to find himself in a psychiatric hospital in 1990’s Moscow? And where does Arnold Schwarzenegger fit into all this? The Clay Machine-Gun is unlike any other novel, demonstrating Pelevin’s genius for metaphysical comedy and manic satire. It is an intellectually dazzling and hilarious fantasy about identity and Russian history, and a spectacular elaboration of Buddhist philosophy.