I loved these stories. Pilnyak was one of the greatest stars in the Russian firmament in the 1920s. But he sabotaged himself and, indeed, his life by writing a thinly veiled story about the death in an operating room of a general whom Stalin considered a potential threat. And Pilnyak included a Stalin-like figure in the story. It did not reflect well (to say the least) and, despite his denials, it probably spelled the beginning of the end for him. Several years down the road he was shot in the back of the head. The story is included in this collection and it’s terrific. Most of the stories—and most are brilliant—reflect a nostalgia for traditional peasant life. The writing (at least in my translation) was simple and straightforward; he was not a superb stylist (so far as I can tell in translation) but he was a wonderful storyteller and a great writer.
P.S. Re Pilnyak: I should have added a line or two mentioning his style, which is not always a straightforward narrative. As the translators pointed out (in their very useful forward), Pilnyak emulated Andrei Bely. If you know anything about Bely or Petersburg, you'll know that Bely was very fond of...let's call them quirks of style, including repetition of entire paragraphs or shifts in time or the use of patterns. It can be slightly off-putting but it seems to be more present in some pieces and nearly absent in others. Pilnyak is not a symbolist but there can be stories where his quirks become, uh, intrusive (I thought). So, just a "warning"--or, perhaps, a word to the wise--that you may find his writing a little more challenging than a simple narrative. ( )