Diana Markosian: Santa Barbara

In 1996, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Markosians mother, Svetlana, placed a classified ad in a Los Angeles newspaper: I want to see America, and meet a kind man who can show me the country, she wrote. One man who responded was from Santa Barbara, California, and their correspondence led to Svetlana becoming a mail-order bride, fleeing her increasingly dreary prospects in post-Soviet Moscow with seven-year-old Markosian and her older brother in tow. This book is a retelling of the familys first years in the US, imagined as an episode from the soap opera Santa Barbara--the first American show allowed on Russian television in the 1990s. For many families, including Markosians, this soap opera symbolized the opportunities of America and the West; for her project, Markosian wrote a script in collaboration with one of the original Santa Barbara writers and hired actors to reenact moments from her personal history.