Steppe, a novel translated from the Russian by Elina Alter '16, was published January 20, 2026 with Catapult Press.
The novel follows a queer literature student who joins her estranged father in a journey across the vast Russian plains a decade after he walked out on their family. As they truck across the steppe together, she must grapple with her father's history, his secrets, and their strained relationship.
Oksana Vasyakina is a Russian poet and curator whose work has been awarded a NOS Prize and has been listed for the Andrei Bely Prize. Her first novel, Wound, was featured in Vogue as a "profound and undeniably queen account of Russian homegoing," and was also translated into English by Alter in 2023.
Already, Steppe has been named a Most Anticipated Book of the Year by LGBTQ Reads and a Most Anticipated Queer Book of the Month by Autostraddle.
Kirkus Reviews calls Steppe, "An elegiac tribute to a fatally flawed bond." The Gay and Lesbian Review calls Steppe "a portrait of a certain class of Russians, and by extension the history of Russia itself." Finally, Publisher’s Weekly calls the narrator "compassionate" and "clear-eyed."
Alter is a writer and translator living in New York. Her work appears in The Los Angeles Review of Books, BOMB, The Paris Review, The New England Review, and elsewhere. She is the editor of Circumference, a journal of translation and international culture.
