At the onset of the Second World War, Frank Pleszak’s father Miko Aaj, aged nineteen, was forcibly removed from his family in Poland by the Russian secret police and exiled to the harshest of the Siberian labour camps, the dreaded Soviet gulags of Kolyma. Miko Aaj spoke very little about it. Only very occasionally would his painful memories allow him to tell Frank and his siblings a little snippet of information. After his father’s death, Frank became intrigued and began researching Miko Aaj’s early life. As he discovered more and more, he became amazed and shocked at the ordeals his father had endured. When Germany invaded Russia, Miko Aaj was freed from Kolyma but still had many trials yet to face. Miko Aaj survived gulags, torture, and the war, but was never allowed to return home. Frank has followed his father’s footsteps on a journey of 40, 000 kilometres, through places most of us have never heard of, a journey through despair, fear, hope and disappointment, and in these pages he recounts everything he discovered along the way. This true story occurred during a largely unknown and poorly documented period of modern history that has been denied by successive Russian Governments and largely ignored by western governments and media. Two Years in a Gulag provides a valuable insight into not only Miko Aaj’s story but the story of a whole Polish nation.