Mom, a Kharkivi child of WW2, lost everything (and everyone). In the 1980s it fell to me, her deaf child, to bear witness to her past, find her lost sister and thus confirm her childhood memories. Due to the nebulousness of these memories, this book—a lyrical mix of memoir and biography—fairytale—drifts into magical realism to tell aspects of the tale, too dreamlike to be true. And yet, the process of helping my mother establish her identity, while she denies my twin identities of deafness and queerness—makes for a sometimes-loving romp from DC to Toronto to Harbin and finally to Kharkiv, in search of clues. The drama intensifies in 2014 when I find Mom’s sister just as she dies. Instead of a sisterly reunion, I tell Mom that her sister is found, but dead. Escaped zoo monkeys and a crow watch over my mom’s escape out of Stalinism as a child. Seventy-five years later, Kharkiv, Ukraine welcomes her return where, now eighty-five, she discovers her own existence.