Behind the Fiction
The Real Jack Parker
April 12, 2026 · 8 min read
American lawyer. Kyiv, 1991. What followed became The Steel Barons.
I came back when the system collapsed and nobody knew the rules. Built a law firm in the middle of it. Started writing when I realized some of it shouldn't be forgotten.
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Kyiv PostWashington UniversitySean Penn's SuperpowerIMDBUS-Ukraine Business CouncilPennsylvania Bar
The Steel Barons: A Gritty True Story of Corruption, Crime, and Survival in 1990s Ukraine
4.44/5 · Goodreads (218 reviews)
A true story of law, betrayal, and survival in Ukraine's Wild East. The Steel Barons follows the harrowing descent of Jack Parker, a thirty-year-old American lawyer sent to Kyiv in the early 1990s to negotiate a multimillion-dollar telecom deal. It should have been a fast track to equity partnership in one of Manhattan's most prestigious law firms. Instead, one reckless night lands him in a Soviet-era venereal disease clinic — and from there, everything begins to unravel. Abandoned by his firm, hunted by mob-connected investors, and betrayed by his own government, Jack finds himself stranded in a country where bribes are justice, bullets settle disputes, and survival depends on who you know — and what you're willing to do.
"A time machine to 1990s Ukraine — painfully close to reality. Frishberg writes the truth as fiction because the truth is too dangerous to print."
Lawyer by day. Thriller writer by night. Survivor always.
Born in Kyiv, Alex emigrated to the United States in 1974 to escape Soviet antisemitism. He earned his JD from Washington University in 1988 — and then made the decision that would define his life.
In 1991, with the Soviet Union collapsing, he boarded a plane back to the city of his birth and founded Frishberg & Partners, the American-owned corporate law firm that has weathered three decades of revolution, crisis, and now war.
He is the only American author who lived the Wild East from the inside — and he is still there, still writing, today.
Dispatches from Kyiv
Behind the fiction, beyond the headlines, and inside the country I have spent thirty years learning to read.
