A Good Read

“This is a fascinating story of everyday life under the Communist Regime in Czechoslovakia. We learn how the daily lives of ordinary people suffered, and the steps needed to be taken just to survive.

I am looking forward to the next volume covering the writer, Peter Kysel’s, experiences in the UK.”

Fascinating read from Peter Kysel

“A brilliant book charting a remarkable period of history. Kysel is a real raconteur, Age of Storms is packed full of interesting anecdotes, and actually, despite the subject matter, a crackling sense of wit and humour.

For an inside look at a topic that is not well understood enough. Whether you know everything or nothing about the history of Czechoslovakia, I highly recommend reading this book!”

Full of wonderful warmth and humour

“This is a fascinating, immensely readable tale, of someone growing up in Czechoslovakia at the end of WWII. It is engaging and charming in its honesty. What is most fascinating is the relating of the author’s experiences alongside the detailed and accurately documented influences of politics, engineering and popular culture in Eastern Europe at that time. Full of wonderful warmth and humour, the wit which has helped the author survive the systems designed to crush his generation is revealed as he breaks free and makes his way to the West.”

…but told with the verve and energy of a young man who wasn’t going to let the system get the better of him

“The story of a childhood and youth spent under the shadow of discrimination and oppression in Communist-era Czechoslovakia, but told with the verve and energy of a young man who wasn’t going to let the system get the better of him. A delightful read, this book draws you in to the trials and tribulations of adolescence, as well as its pleasures, not least those of rebelling against a crudely authoritarian regime that attempted to practise total surveillance of its subjects. The book is also a fascinating and well researched family history that begins in the 1920s and ends with the Soviet invasion of Prague in 1968, which prompted the author to make a new life for himself in Britain.”