He was born on June 8, 1977, in Alchevsk, Luhansk Oblast, into a family of military personnel. He graduated from the Dnipropetrovsk Chemical-Technological Institute with a degree in chemistry. From the first days of the full-scale Russian invasion, he joined first the Territorial Defense Forces and later a special operations battalion, with which he participated in combat operations in the Kharkiv, Kherson, and Donetsk regions[3]. His military rank is junior sergeant. Nominations for the book *You Can’t Fight, You Can’t Retreat*:
Shortlist for the BBC Book of the Year Award 2024
“Svoia Politsa” Ukrainian Genre Literature Award (2025)
Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine in the “Prose” category (2026)
Pavlo Belianskyi
Ukraine
writer