Biography of S.K. Nave (1923-1982)
	"There's no point in comparing my troubles with your troubles. I honestly believe that everyone's life is as hard as they were built to handle. You have cancer? You're able to bear that burden. You were born into wealth? You're pushed to edge of what you think you can endure. Life is hard for everyone. But whatever your struggles are, you and only you were uniquely designed for that fight."
	--S.K. Nave

Sonja Katarina Navrotsky was born the twelfth child (and seventh daughter) of Pasha and Anastasia Navrotsky in a small village southeast of what is now St. Petersburg in February 1923. She was a precocious child and taught herself to read both Russian and Greek by poring over borrowed copies of the Holy Bible by candlelight.

Her parents' plans to have her married off at a "reasonable" young age were thwarted by a series of bouts with pneumonia which debilitated her for most of her teens and into her early twenties. She was just beginning to recover her strength when war with Hitler's Germany broke out.

During World War II, she was spared from combat (where, like many of her brothers & sisters and millions of her countrymen, she almost certainly would have been killed) by her reading skills. She was put to work by the Party as a typesetter at one of the many propaganda printing presses in Moscow where she remained after the Allied victory.

My grandmother rarely spoke about the years following the war under Stalinism, nor does she delve into any detail in her autobiography. Needless to say, these were incredibly brutal and painful years for her. My mothers says she once or twice heard my grandmother refer to some early short story writings from this period, but none of them have survived.

In 1956, she abruptly married Mikhail Navrotsky (no relation) who was a promising rocket scientist from Kazhakstan when he was visiting Moscow that summer. The two defected to the United States during a chemical propellant conference in Oslo, Norway that winter.

Upon arrival in New York, the couple promptly changed their name to a more Anglicized form -- Nave -- and began the work of starting a family. Although times were difficult in those early years, they managed to make ends meet. My grandmother's first novel (DAWN AT MIDNIGHT) and her first child both arrived in 1959. My uncle Carl was soon joined by my aunt Edna and my mother Evelyn. The family numbered five by the time John Fitzgerald Kennedy was sworn into office.

While my grandmother's first three novels began to enjoy brisk sales, my grandpa Mikhail got a good job with a handsome paycheck at a New Jersey chemical laboratory where he worked until his death in 1975 from lung cancer at the age of 61.

My grandmother continued writing for the rest of her life. At my mother's urging, she even began composing an autobiography (although it was never published and only exists in manuscript form.) Despite what some crackpots believe, S.K. Nave died in her sleep on October 9, 1982 at the age of 59. Over one thousand mourners attended her memorial service in New York City.