Twelve Kilometres

Abstract

Twelve stories and a coda from the partition years. In the winter of 2006 a government in Talas drew up papers to sell the country; in the spring of 2009 men in two kinds of uniform went into the mountains with concrete pillars and numbered them. In between came a war that Iradis still find hard to name, and a line that runs through families, valleys and graveyards. A translator kneels on a ministry carpet with a map she should never have seen; a night watchman signs a letter for the first time in his life; a priest blesses a hundred and thirty-nine horses and not one man; a boy from Semiz leads a horse with its saddle turned backwards; a walnut trader's daughter walks four hundred metres of empty road between two posts. The author's first book, with a glossary, a translator's note and the author's note on the title.

Contents

1. A Note on the Title
2. 1Contingency PapersDecember 2006 – February 2007, Talas
3. 2DieselJanuary 2007, the Chu valley
4. 3Kobozev Is Listening25 February 2007, Nurzhan
5. 4SignaturesMarch 2007, Talas
6. 5Mother LeavenApril 2007, the Chatkal valley
7. 6The ApronsApril 2007 – November 2008, Semiz
8. 7Bread CardsMay 2007, Talas
9. 8The Armory4 June 2007, Talas
10. 9Bazaar ChubarAugust – October 2007, Bazar-Korgon
11. 10One to One Hundred ThousandSeptember 2007, Bishkek
12. 11SwitchyardWinter 2008–09, the Toktogul dam
13. 12PillarMarch 2009, the Kenkol valley
14. CodaNot for SaleOctober 2011, Bazar-Korgon
15. Glossary
16. A Note on the Translation
17. Acknowledgements
18. About the Author

Record

Title	Twelve Kilometres (On Eki Chakyrym)
Author	Aikokul Tursunbek kyzy
Translator	Aidana Mukash kyzy
Publisher	Arsha Books, Talas
Published	Iradi original 2015; English translation 2016
Form	Stories
Written	Talas, 2007–2015
Language	English, translated from the Iradi
Extent	97 pages · about 23,700 words
Subjects	Bill of Sale (2006–2007); Second Civil War (2007); Qara-Chik line; Bishkek ceasefire (2007); Demarcation (2009); Talas; Nurzhan; Bazar-Korgon; Semiz; Chatkal valley; Toktogul dam; Families divided by the line
Collection	Iradi Literature
Accession no.	TSU-DA-2026-0146
Legal deposit	State Archives of Irad, LD 2016/1174
Added	15 October 2026
Rights	Text © Aikokul Tursunbek kyzy, 2015. Translation © Aidana Mukash kyzy, 2016. Digitised by the National Library of Irad from its deposit copy with the permission of the author, the translator and Arsha Books, for reading and research. Not for commercial reuse.

How to cite

Tursunbek kyzy, Aikokul. Twelve Kilometres (On Eki Chakyrym). Translated by Aidana Mukash kyzy. Arsha Books, Talas, 2016. National Library of Irad (Talas State University), Digital Archive, TSU-DA-2026-0146. https://talasuniversity.org/library/archive/twelve-kilometres/