Rights Catalogue Autumn 2012

Rights Catalogue Autumn 2012
RUSSIAN LITERARY FICTION
QUALITY COMMERCIAL FICTION & NON-FICTION
Banke, Goumen & Smirnova Literary Agency
www.bgs-agency.com
19/2 Nauki pr., Fl. 293
195220 St Petersburg
Russia
Föreningsg. 48C
212 14 Malmö
Sweden

TABLE OF CONTENTS
LITERARY FICTION
Mikhail Shishkin
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya
Marina Stepnova
Victor Martinovich
Lena Eltang
Vladimir Lorchenkov
IgorSakhnovsky
Sergey Kuznetsov
Mikhail Elizarov
QUALITY COMMERCIAL FICTION
Maria Galina
Yana Vagner
Dmitry Savochkin
Anna Starobinets
Andrei Rubanov
Dmitry Kosyrev
Max Frei
Sergei Kostin
NON-FICTION
Anna Arutunyan
Pavel Basinsky
Alexander Genis
Petr Vail
Lilianna Lungina
SPECIAL PROJECTS
Sveta Dorosheva

BIG BOOK AWARD 2011, BIG BOOK AWARD 2006,
NATIONAL BESTSELLER PRIZE 2005, BOOKER PRIZE 2000
Mikhail Shishkin
Mikhail Shishkin born January 18, 1961 in Moscow, based in Switzerland since 1995, is one of
the most prominent names in the modern Russian literature. Before becoming a writer he worked
as school teacher and journalist. His writing debut in 1993, CALLIGRAPHY LESSON, a short story
translated into French and Finnish, has won him the Prize for the Best Debut of the Year. Since
then his works – both fi ction and non-fi ction – have been translated into 12 languages and have
received a large number of prestigious national and international awards, including National Bestseller
Prize, National Big Book Prize and many others.
Mikhail Shishkin’s prose fuses the best of the Russian and European literary traditions. � e richness
and sophistication of the language, the unique rhythm and melody of a phrase, the endless
play with words and the nuanced psychological undercurrent are reminiscent of Nabokov and
Chekhov. � e change of narration styles and narrators within a text yield a fragmented, mosaic
structure of composition that focuses on the language itself, recalling James Joyce’s genius.
Selected list of prizes and awards:
2011 Big Book Award
2011 Haus der Kulturen der Welt International Literature
Award
2007 Halpérine-Kaminski Prize for the Best Translation (Laure
Troubeckoy), France
2007 Shortlist for Giuseppe Berto Prize, Italy
2007 Grinzane Cavour Prize, Italy
Peoples Literature Publishing, Peking: � e Best Foreign Book
of the Year of the 21st Century, China
2006 Shortlist for Bunin Literary Award, Russia
English, German, French
translations available
AST, 2010, 412 pp
Rights sold:
World English Quercus UK;
Germany DVA; Japan
Shinchosha; Spain Lumen /
Random House Mondadori;
Netherlands Querido; France
Noir sur blanc; Finland
WSOY; Norway Oktober;
Sweden Ersatz; Serbia
Paideia; Czech Republic
Vìtrné mlýny; Lithuania Vaga;
Latvia Jumava; Bulgaria
Fakel; Estonia Varrak;
Hungary Cartaphilus; Arabic
Arab Scientifi c Publishers;
Faroe Islands Sprotin;
Denmark Batzer & Co;
Slovakia Slovart; Romania
Curtea Veche; Poland Noir
sur Blanc; Israel Kinneret
Zmora Dvir Publ.; China
Hunan People Publishing
House
Prizes:
Big Book Award 2011
Haus der Kulturen der Welt
International Literature
Award 2011
2006 National Big Book Prize, Russia
2006 Shortlist for Andrei Belyi Literary Award, Russia
2005 National Bestseller Prize, Russia
2005 Best Foreign Book of the Year / Le prix du meilleur livre
étranger (essay), France
2002 Main Literary Prize of Zürich (Werkjahr), Switzerland
2000 Booker Prize for the Best Russian Novel of the Year,
Russia
2000 Globus Prize, Russia
2000 Literary Prize of Canton Zürich, Switzerland
1994 Prize for the Best Debut of the Year, Russia
Letter-book
� is new novel by Mikhail Shishkin is deceivingly simple. A man.
A woman. � eir love letters. A summer house, the fi rst love.
Vladimir – Vovka-carrot-top and Alexandra – Sashka; he goes to
war, she stays at home, living an ordinary life. Two people writing
each other just about everything - their childhood, families,
trifl es of life, joys and sorrows – what could be more normal?
Until we realize that things are not as simple as they seem. � e
deeper we emerge into the writing the more obvious it becomes
that the time has been disunited, dissected and tossed together
as in a children nonsense rhyme. � e time is indeed out of
joint and only these letters bind it together restoring the world’s
order. She lives in the 60-s, he goes to the Boxers uprising in
China of the turn of the twentieth century. He dies in the very fi st
battle of this half-forgotten war of his own choosing (“What
war? Doesn’t matter. A war has always been. And will always
be. And people get injuries and killed. And death is real”) – but
his letters keep coming. She get married, carries and loses a
child – and keeps writing to him as if these letters exist in a parallel
universe, as if time doesn’t matter – and neither does
death. � is is a novel about the mysteries of life – and acceptance
of death. Once again as in all Shishkin’s novels the written
word is the key – but so is love. “To exist you have to live not in
your own mind that is so unreliable… but in the mind of another
person, and not just any person but the one who cares if you
exist.” Shishkin’s sophisticated language and intricate style has
already won him every possible literary prize as well as comparisons
to the some of the greatest authors of our time – and
this novel only confi rms that well-deserved reputation.

ONE OF THE FINEST LIVING RUSSIAN WRITERS,
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya was born in Moscow in 1938. Petrushevskaya studied journalism
at Moscow State University, and began writing prose in the mid ‘60s. Her fi rst
work was published in 1972, only to be followed by almost ten years of offi cially enforced
silence, when the publication of her plays and prose was forbidden. At that time
Petrsuhevskaya earned her living by working as a radio and television journalist and
contributing to newspapers and literary Magazines. When her somber and disturbing
absurdist plays were fi nally staged, Ludmilla Petrushevskaya became widely recognized
as one of Russia’s fi nest dramatists. A collection of short stories and monologues,
Immortal Love, was published in 1988 and met with stunning success among
readers and critics alike. In 1992 Petrushevskaya’s novel � e Time: Night was shortlisted
for the Russian Booker Prize; it was translated into more 30 languages and included
in college courses as one of the most important novels of the 20th century.
Since then, Petrushevskaya has published over 30 books of prose. A 5-volume set of
her writings was published in Russia in 1996. Today, award-winning plays by Petrushevskaya
are produced around the world, while her prose pieces have been published in
more than 30 countries. Ludmila Petrushevskaya is considered to be the only indisputably
canonical writer currently at work in Russia today.
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya’s recent publications (� ere Once Lived a Woman Who Tried
to Kill Her Neighbors’ Baby, 2010; � e Black Butterfl y, 2009; Number One, or in the
Gardens of Other Possibilities, 2004; � e City of Light, 2005) have established her
reputation with a new generation of readers as a master of the mystical thriller and
short stories of magical realism.
In 1991, Petrushevskaya was awarded the Pushkin Prize by the Alfred Toepfer Foundation
in Germany. She has also received prizes from the leading literary journals in
Russia. Petrushevskaya’s novels � e Time: Night and Number One… were short-listed
for the Russian Booker Prize. In 2002, Petrushevskaya received Russia’s most prestigious
prize, � e Triumph, for lifetime achievement. Petrushevskaya’s play BIFEM was
awarded the fi rst prize at the New Drama Festival in 2003. In 2003 Ludmilla Petrushevskaya
was awarded the State Prize of Russian Federation. � e World Fantasy Award
for the short stories collection.
Amphora, Russia
2006, 103 pp
Rights sold:
France Christian Bourgois
Lithuania Vaga
Italy Tartaruga
Romania Meteor
Th e little girl from the metropol
“One of the fi nest living Russian writers…
Her signature black humor and
matter-of-fact prose result in an insightful
and sympathetic portrait of a family in
crisis.” – Publishers Weekly
“Petrushevskaya is a strikingly original
author.” – Th e Guardian
“Told in an intimate, loose, over-theback-fence
style, this is an alternately
funny and desperate book – a welcome
introduction to a strong talent.” – Kirkus
Review
“Th e writing is beautifully controlled and
the spirit large… She deserves a wide
readership.” – TLS
“A wonderfully talented and signifi cant
writer.” – John Bayley
“Th e Ti me is Night is one of the most powerful
books on poverty that has ever been
written.” – Amazon.com
“Petrushevskaya writes with humour, and
has an obliqueness of style and unexpectedness
of form that give the reader a sense
of having found something unusual and
unfamiliar.” – Sunday Ti mes
� is is not a typical fi ction memoir. � rough the prism of the story of her family, Ludmilla
Petrushevskaya draws a compelling portrait of the era of communist Russia.
With brilliant precision and telling details, Petrushevskaya
draws a gallery of portraits of the Muscovite
intelligentsia as they struggle to survive in
the new - poverty-stricken and ignorant - country.
� e author recalls her beautiful grandmother,
whom the poet Vladimir Mayakovsky was in love
with; her great-aunt, lover of head-of-state Mikhail
Kalinin; and her grandfather, a celebrated linguist,
one of the fathers of the Moscow linguistic circle.
� ese characters are set next to violent and ruthless
neighbors who attack Ludmilla’s grandmother
with an axe when she wants to use the bathroom
in their communal fl at, and beat Ludmilla if
she is found rummaging in their slop-pail for the
remains of food. � e 8-year-old girl grows up in
the company of fatherless boys, homeless beggars
and war invalids that crowded the streets of
Saratov (then Kuibyshev), where her family lived
as evacuees during the war.
As the story of a small girl in the hungry post-war
years unfolds, the fate of the enormous country
appears before the reader - a country where the
magical is intertwined with the mundane, beautiful
and refi ned neighbor with terrible ones, and
despair with hope. A family forest grows out of
Petrushevskaya’s memoir, one in which each tree
is at once “a child, a parent, and a personality.”
Nominated for the National Bestseller Prize 2007

Rights sold:
Penguin (US), Penguin
Classics (UK), Berlin Verlag
paperback (Germany),
Christian Bourgois (France)’
Atalanta (Spain), Einaudi
Stile Libero (Italy), Relogio
d’Agua (Portugal), Cappelen
Damm (Norway), Forlaget
Vandkunsten (Denmark),
Shanghai 99 Culture
Consulting (Chinese
simplifi ed characters),
Meteor Press (Romania),
Tänapäev (Estonia), Derin
Kitap (Turkey), Kawade
Shobo Shinsha (Japan)
Awards:
� e World Fantasy Award
2010
Eksmo, Russia
2004, 336 pp
Rights sold:
Denmark Vandkunsten
Poland Swiat Ksiazki
China Chu Chen Books
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya
Th ere once lived a woman who killed
her neighbors’ baby
A master of the short story genre, Ludmilla Petrushevskaya dazzles the imagination
with explorations of death, love, space, time and identity.
In her magical-realistic stories that at once recall
Ka� a, Borges and Gogol, Petrushevskaya pictures
the deprived and desperate – orphans,
childless women, lonely elderly people – in
search of love and happiness, in their struggle
for life.
� e fantastic (magical transformations, resurrection
of the dead, living dolls and magical objects)
merges here into reality, authentically captured
by the author. Petrushevskaya’s signature
prose, harrowing and painfully sensitive, seems
to strip off your skin, making your naked nerves
shudder at the touch of this fi ctional reality that
is much too close for comfort.
Here is a childless woman who grows a girl in a
cabbage, or a girl attempts suicide and fi nds herself
in a horrid, unlit apartment building chased
by monstrous lorry drivers, escaping a split second
before it is too late to come back to life. Set
against a bleak background, Petrushevskaya’s
“fairy-tales for grownups”, as the author defi nes
the genre, are amazingly dynamic and ingenious.
English translation available
#34 in NY Times bestsellers list, #15 in Amazon.com in translated fi ction
and #5 last week in � e Strand
«One of Russia’s best living writers…Every one of the 19 stories in Petrushevskaya’s “Th ere Once
Lived a Woman Who Tried to Kill Her Neighbor’s Baby” presents an arresting parable of this kind.
Ti meless and troubling, these “scary fairy tales” grapple with accidents of fate and weaknesses of
human nature that exact a heavy penance. Short, highly concentrated, inventive and disturbing,
her tales inhabit a borderline between this world and the next, a place where vengeance and grace
may be achieved only in dreams». New York Ti mes Review of Books
Number one, or in the gardens of other possibilities
� e long-awaited new novel from “one of Russia’s fi nest living writers” far exceeded
the expectations of Petrushevskaya’s vast number of devoted readers and triggered
heated discussions in the press.
� e bullet-paced, breathtaking narrative opens
with a brilliantly rendered dialogue between a research
fellow (Number One) and the director of an
ethnographic research institute (Number Two).
Ivan (Number One), an underpaid, enthusiastic scientist,
father of a handicapped child and clandestine
creator of a computer game called In the Gardens
of Other Possibilities, reports the results of
his last expedition to the settlements of the nearly
extinct Antti people, whose beliefs and myths
merit international scientifi c attention. Number
One plays a recording of the incantations of the
powerful shaman of the Antti, who is an adept in
the transmigration of souls and knows the way to
the evil world of the dead. Ivan has to persuade
the director to fi nd 5,000 US dollars in ransom
money for his colleague Kukharev, kidnapped during
the expedition. Ivan fails to return to the settlement
with the money – he is robbed, and the
violent pursuit of the thieves ends in the double
murder of Ivan and Valery, one of the criminals.
Instead of dying, Ivan fi nds himself in the body of
the thief – and in the centre of the grim reality of
the criminal world of Russia’s provinces. As
Valery’s body suppresses the consciousness of
the intellectual researcher and determines Ivan’s
actions, the intricately concocted story escalates
into a blood-curdling thriller.
Petrushevskaya’s unsurpassed mastery in rendering
the shi� s in the linguistic personalities of
the intellectual and the thief, and the dense, concentrated
narrative that is the author’s signature
technique, open up new textual realms. In the fi ctional
world of Petrushevskaya, the boundaries
between the real and the surreal, between everyday
existence and the reality of a computer game,
are blurred, and her heroes wander along the
“forked paths” in the “gardens of other possibilities”
that spiral into endless limbos of personal
and social hells – the hell of life, the hell of culture,
the hell of eternity.
Written in the matrix of the modern mystical
thriller, Number One puts forward the ontological
oppositions of body vs. soul, living vs. being, and
draws a compelling portrait of an almost-extinct
Russian intelligentsia.

Marina Stepnova
Marina Stepnova was born in 1971 in the small town of Efremov, in the Tula region. Marina was
raised in Moscow, where she now lives. She graduated from � e Gorky Literary Institute and did
postgraduate studies at the Institute of World Literature. Stepnova’s translation from Romanian
of the play Nameless Star by Mihail Sebastian has been staged by numerous theaters throughout
Russia. Marina Stepnova is the author of short stories and the novel � e Surgeon, which won her
the nomination for the National Bestseller Prize and broad critical acclaim.
Marina Stepnova works as a editor-in-chief of the men’s magazine XXL. She lives with her family
in Moscow and is at work on her next novel.
Selected Bibliography
2011 – � e Women of Lazarus, novel
2005 – � e Surgeon, novel
AST, Astrel, Moscow
September 2011, 444 pp
Rights sold:
Germany Random House/btb
Sweden 2244
Estonia Tänapäev
Hungary Európa Publishers
Lithuania Tyto Alba
Awards:
Shortlisted for the National
Bestseller 2012
Shortlisted for Big Book
Award 2012
Shortlisted for Russian
Booker Award 2012
Shortlisted for Lev Tolstoy
Yasnaya Polyana Literary
Award
Book of the Month by
Moscow Book Store
Th e Women of Lazarus
A� er the success of her debut novel � e Surgeon (2005), which gained her the nomination
for the National Bestseller Prize and enthusiastic critical acclaim, Marina
Stepnova returns with a mesmerizing story of love, loss and human genius.
Marusia and Sergei Chaldonov are indeed blessed
in their marriage. He – a respectable scientist
with a bright academic career ahead, despite the
revolutionary turmoil in Russia at dawn of the
20th century; she – a beautiful, kind, and intelligent
wife. � eir complete happiness is marred by
one thing only: the couple is childless. A� er the
fi rst years of disappointment and doubt, Marusia
makes a deal with God, the terms of which she
never reveals to her husband. And in 1918, when
Marusia is 49 years old, a child is bestowed on
the couple. � is child is Lazarus Lindt: 18-yearold
self-educated maverick, true genius and a
peer of the troubled century.
Lazar, too, loves Marusia, and with a passion that
is diff erent from fi lial love. � e off spring of a poor
Jewish family of which nothing is known besides
their name, the prodigy Lazarus Lindt becomes
Sergei Chaldonov’s brightest pupil, his follower,
and in no time outdoes his champion. An easy
winner in all fi elds of science, Lazar fails to accomplish
what he wants most. Marusia will never
know about the true nature of Lazarus’s feelings
– not when he, already an acclaimed physicist
and head of a promising line in nuclear physics,
follows the Chaldonovs to Ansk during the
evacuation and stays in the provincial town when
Marusia decides against returning to Moscow
a� er the war; not when the jouir and bon vivant
refuses to introduce Marusia to any of his numerous
lovers; not even when Lazarus takes his
chances and articulates his feelings at Sergei
Chaldonov’s anniversary. Marusia’s open-hearted
and easy response – “I love you too”– leaves no
hope for Lazarus.
English and German samples available
Lindt gets love-struck for the second time in his
life years a� er Marusia’s quiet and peaceful
death. Galina – all peaches and cream, an exceptionally
beautiful 18-year-old assistant at a Department
of Chemistry in the Ansk Engineering
Institute of Water Supply – plans her happy and
simple family life with a postgraduate student,
when her future knocks on the door of the Department
in the guise of the Institute’s guest lecturer,
living classic of the physical sciences and
father of the Soviet atomic bomb, Lazarus Lindt.
Galina responds to Lazarus’ passion with virulent
hatred unto death, with the stubbornness of a
simple and shallow nature. She will never love
anyone else, not even her son, who commits suicide
a� er a fatal accident befalls his wife, leaving
their 5-year-old daughter Lida an orphan. � e
lovely tomboy Lida soon learns to endure pain,
living through the spiteful indiff erence of her
grandmother Galina, the physical strains of ballet
school, and the despair of unrequited fi rst love.
Lida is yet to discover that sometimes you have
to go to the farthest ends of the earth and even
to die to fi nd your love – and your home.
Marina Stepnova has depicted the country’s
20th century on a broad canvas, permeating it
with rhyming fates, echoes of feelings, and the
tiniest movements of the human soul. � e author’s
unprecedented literary command enables
the reader to marvel and wonder at new meanings
underlying the most basic notions of family,
home, happiness, and love.

Victor Martinovich
Victor Martinovich (1977), born in Oshmiany, Belorussia, is a political scientist, doctor of art history,
and professor of the State European University in Vilnius. He is the author of four novels, two
of them as yet unpublished.
Paranoia, published in Russia at the end of 2009, was pulled from sale in Belorussia two days
a� er it hit the bookshelves. Diane Nemec Ignashev received a 2011 PEN Translation Fund grant
for her translation of the novel, which will be published in English by Northwestern University
Press at the end of 2012.
An excerpt from the novel appeared in Epiphany, New York, in February 2012. Victor Martinovich’s
story Taboo was selected for the Best European Fiction 2011 anthology (Dalkey Archive). � e
fi rst novel by Victor Martinovich written in the Belorussian language was longlisted for the socalled
Belorussian Booker Prize (named a� er Jerzy Giedroyc), and became the fi nalist of the Bogdanovich
Literary Award. Victor Martinovich has just completed a new novel, Sfagnum, a comic
gangster novel set in the Belorussian countryside.
Novel: Astrel/AST
2009, 352 pp
Rights sold:
USA, Northwestern
University Press
Finland Like
Sweden Ersatz
English translation soon
available
“In his novel, [Martinovich] renews some
of the major themes of classic Eastern European
dissident literature. Th e system is
not simply the rulers; it is also the ruled.
Self-policing is more important than policing.
Lovers betray each other wittingly
or unwittingly. We all betray ourselves in
the end. In the character of Anatoly, Martinovich
portrays a writer who, while criticizing
the aesthetics of totalitarianism,
is drawn toward its power. Anatoly
encounters the state in the attractive me-
Paranoia
� is dramatic story about impossible love, madness, and murder has become a
stronger indictment of the totalitarian state than any political statement to come
out of Belorussia to date. � e reaction from the authorities was quick, yet unprecedented:
the novel by Victor Martinovich was banned in Belorussia right a� er its
publication in the Russian language.
Paranoia tells the story of the writer Anatoly
Nevinsky (the last name sounds like “innocent”),
who gained an international reputation as author
of sharp political satires against a modern
police state. His denunciations of Muraviev, minister
of the state security organization (the MGB,
analogous to the Soviet KGB, with vaster powers
of enforcement), and the country’s actual
dictator, has put Nevinsky under close surveillance.
Anatoly is aware that the secret service is
watching his every step: whether the online publication
of a story, an exchange of emails with his
German agent, or a visit to a coff ee shop for a
cup of green tea. � e secret service watches
Anatoly as he fi rst meets Liza Supranovich, a local
girl enjoying a latte macchiato in his favorite
coff ee place. � eir romance develops swi� ly into
a relationship, and the couple rents a fl at where
they continue to meet.
Anatoly and Liza fear they are being followed,
and though this paranoia o� en becomes the occasion
of jokes, the reader knows better: the
second part of the novel is written as a decoding
of the time the couple has spent together in their
bugged love-nest, with commentary on the lovers’
every word and sound. In the decoded recordings,
the lovers are referred to as “Gogol”
dium of a young woman’s body”. – NYRB,
October 28th, 2010
“Absurdity, appropriately jittery language,
the Minsk setting, humor, and
odd details, such as Anatoly’s Rasta friend
with his useful connections, give Paranoia
special appeal, and Martinovich’s
observations oft en show real humor”. –
Lizok’s Bookshelf (lizoksbooks.blogspot.
com/2011/02/modern-minsk-martinovichs-paranoia.html)
“Paranoia is a novel about love in a time
(Anatoly) and the Fox (Liza).
Anatoly is so smitten with the girl that he chooses
to ignore certain suspicious things about Liza:
a recent graduate, and an orphan with no close
family in the state elite, she owns a number of
fl ats, a luxuriously furnished country house, and
several expensive sports cars. Offi cers of the
traffi c police salute as she speeds by. Liza confesses
the source of her privileges: she is the
mistress of the omnipotent minister Muraviev.
What’s more, as a smart French literature major,
Liza appreciates Muraviev’s sophistication, eloquence,
and even his artful performance on the
piano. Anatoly fears lest Liza’s love for him might
just be the reverse side of her feelings towards
the state dictator. � is ménage a trois drama
takes off as true dystopian noir when Liza admits
she is expecting a child and that Muraviev
may be the father. Soon, Liza disappears and is
reported to have been murdered. Anatoly is the
only suspect.
� e young intellectuals weave their love story
with remarkable brilliance of style. Yet when the
ghost of paranoia takes on fl esh and blood, their
carefully concocted world turns into Ka� a’s Castle
– trapping the protagonists in its deadly consequences.
of dictatorship. Th e love between a man
and a woman is described with freshness,
depth, and joy. In the background
is the dark, sinister world of authoritarian
rule, with its frozen emotions, unspoken
truths, and bizarre understanding of reality
– so entrenched in people’s heads that
they are unsure which thoughts and fears
are their own, and which are implanted in
their minds by an insidious, overbearing
power.” – Transitions Online

“BEST NOVEL OF THE DECENNIUM” –
FOUNDER OF NATIONAL BESTSELLER AWARD
Eksmo, 2011
640 pp
Prizes:
Shortlisted for the Big Book
Literary Award 2012
Shortlisted for Russian
Literary Prize 2011
Option publishers:
Latvia Janis Roze
Lithuania Vaga
Lena Eltang
Lena Eltang was born in 1964 in Leningrad. A journalist and a translator, she has also become
known as a poet a� er the publication of two collections of poems in 2003 and 2004, and as a
short-prose writer, when her works were included in the Five Names anthology. Blackberry
Shoot, Lena’s fi rst novel, created a stir on the Russian literary scene. � e Other Drums is Eltang’s
third novel to date. Lena has lived in Paris and Copenhagen. She now lives in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Awards:
Shortlisted for the Big Book Literary Award 2012
Shortlisted for Russian Literary Prize 2011
New Literature Award 2010
Th e Other Drums
In � e Other Drums, Lena Eltang’s brilliant third novel, the national prize-winning
author completes the theme of escape and freedom in a work that has prompted
comparisons to such classics as De Profundis and Invitation to a Beheading.
� e novel begins with the arrest of 34-year old
Kostas Kairis, a Lithuanian citizen, in his house
in Lisbon, Portugal. Kostas is not the original
owner of the house; his step-aunt Zoe inherited
the ancient mansion a� er the suicide of her
husband, scion of a noble Portuguese family.
Zoe included Kostas in her will at the last moment,
just a few days before her early demise
from cancer at the age of 44, leaving virtually
nothing to her own daughter. � e aunt’s will
burdens Kostas with mortgage payments to
the bank, and bans him from re-selling the property.
An idle intellectual, Kostas pays the bills
by selling the Braga family furniture and jewelry,
and subletting the house to shadowy business
operations. First, his childhood friend Ljutas
installs cameras into the mansion to shoot
porn movies. � e built-in surveillance appliances
come in handy for blackmailing Kostas’
chance lover, who off ers a share of her husband’s
settlement deal if they catch him with
his pants down on a set-up date with a call girl.
Kostas watches in awe as the date unravels
and a stranger shoots the prostitute with the
Braga family gun. � e blackmailers turn the evidence
of dead body against Kostas, and when
the police come to arrest him several weeks
later on murder charges, Kostas feels relieved
– he will not hesitate to reveal the identities
of the real murderers.
His experience in jail is a rude awakening for
Kostas: he is held in solitary confi nement as a
murderer; the interrogations and meetings
with a lawyer are only occasional; and the
guards o� en forget to bring him his meals. Yet
he’s been allowed to use his laptop– a real
treasure for an undereducated historian turned
writer. Kostas begins by writing a letter to his
Estonian wife, from whom he separated over
fi � een years before. What begins as an explanatory
letter grows during nine weeks of imprisonment
into powerful confessional prose permeated
with guilt, melancholy, and fear of loss.
As Kostas Kairis speaks of people he once
knew, loved and hated, befriended and betrayed,
dreamt of and never came to understand,
the reader of Kostas’ “diary” becomes
the spectator of a street puppet show at which
the director, with a wave of his wand or the
sound of the other drums, exchanges roles
with the cast. � e tension and passion grows
with every page, until one day Kostas begins
thinking the door to the cell is not real either,
throws it open – and walks out.
In her immaculate poetic diction, and with profound
encyclopedic knowledge, Lena Eltang
concocts a unique mosaic of a novel about guilt
and memory that makes us all its voluntary
prisoners.

AST, Russia
2008 , 414 pp
100 000 words
Awards:
New Literature Award
Foreign rights:
Latvia Janis Roze
Lithuania Vaga
Th e Stone Maples
Lena Eltang
A stunning family drama told with the precision of Nabokov and the hypnotic intensity
of Joyce, from the author of Blackberry Shoot (“one of the fi nest novels written
in Russian in years”).
Red-haired Sasha Saunley runs a Bed and
Breakfast called � e Stone Maples in the tiny,
remote village of Wishguard, somewhere on
the moors of Wales. Not only is she considered
weird, she is also rumored to be a witch. Such
a rumor is not absolutely groundless, since she
has refused to speak since the next-door teenagers
killed her dogs, Hugin and Munin, all the
more as � e Stone Maples long ago became a
substitute for her fi ve-o-clock meetings with
the second cousins of her late father. Sasha’s
younger stepsister Edna disappears under obscure
circumstances – while in the courtyard, a
hummock appears with an epitaph for the
«Younger One».
� e possible crime of the Welsh witch becomes
the pretext for a bet – and Llewellyn, a
Londoner, arrives at � e Stone Maples to investigate
what is purported to be a murder.
Sasha’s journal falls into his hands – the passionate,
poetic, and witty confession of an enigmatic
woman. Her love-hate relationship
with her younger stepsister, knotty aff airs with
the locals, envy and betrayal, fantasies, myth,
and legend – all this enchants Llewellyn, and
when he is about to admit his loss of the bet, he
fi nds another of Sasha’s journals, containing
totally diff erent entries. Why does she need
two journals; and, more important, which of
them is truth and which is fi ction?
Told through the journals and letters of Sasha,
her stepmother, and her younger stepsister
Edna Alexandrina, Llewellyn, and Tabitha, the
London girl who is in love with him, this entrancing
family drama reveals one shocking
mystery a� er another. � e most signifi cant
puzzle is broached at the very end.
� e Stone Maples is a breathtakingly deep and
atmospheric novel inhabited by lovable and
vivid characters. Masterly use of cultural layers,
the delicacy of literary allusion reminiscent of
Joyce and Nabokov, and an eerily prophetic
gaze at reality – these are the trademarks of
Lena Eltang, one of the most unique authors
writing in Russian today.

WINNER OF THE RUSSIAN LITERARY
PRIZE 2008
Vladimir Lorchenkov
Vladimir Lorchenkov was born in 1980. A journalist and and prose writer, he was shortlisted and
won numerous literary prizes, including Debut Literary Prize and Russian Literary Prize (for fi ction
written in Russian by authors living outside Russia). Vladimir Lorchenkov is the author of nine
published books. He lives with his wife and small son in Kishinev, Moldova.
Prizes:
Shortlisted for the National Bestseller Prize 2012
Winner of Russian Literary Prize 2008
Winner of Debut Literary Prize
LiveBooks, Russia
2008
Novel, 336 pp
40 000 words
Awards:
Russian Literary Prize 2008
Rights sold:
USA New Vessel
Germany Arche Verlag
Italy Atmopshere Libri
Norway Libretto
Serbia Solaris
Finland Karisto
Milk and Honey
Like Saramago’s � e Stone Ra� , young prize-winning author Vladimir Lorchenkov
addresses both global issues of the human condition and topical matters of modern
European politics in his horrifi c, surrealistic novel.
� is is the phantasmagorical story of dwellers in
the small village of Larga, Moldova, neighbouring
on Italy. True to Leo Tolstoy’s idea that “happy
families are all alike; every unhappy family is
unhappy in its own way,” every Largavite has
his/her own pitiful story, and all of them dream
of going to prosperous Italy as a solution to their
wretched existence. Italy, the land of milk and
honey, becomes their ultimate goal and obsession,
and the dwellers of Larga will stop at nothing
to reach the living paradise.
At fi rst they sell all their property to pay 4000
Euros a head to swindlers, who, a� er several
days of “traveling,” dump the Largavites on the
outskirts of Moldova’s capital city. Having failed
to reach their destination by a direct route, the
Largavites design an aircra� out of an old trac-
tor – which gets shot up by stray fi reworks on a
national holiday. � ey then transform the remains
into a submarine, only to have it sink by a
frontier post. � ey master the sport of curling (to
take part in an international competition); and,
eventually, set off on a crusade, which at last
arouses the general concern of the EU.
Loss, shattered hopes, and broken lives become
the price the dwellers pay to realize an old
truth – we all bear a personal paradise and hell
within us.
Bitter, painfully sardonic and insightful, Milk and
Honey takes on a deeply tragic note, as it sharply
articulates universal assumptions that reveal
themselves in a subversive perspective.

Eksmo, Russia
2010
416 pp
Gypsy Camp: Th e Exodus
Vladimir Lorchenkov
� is harsh political grotesque from prize-winning author Vladimir Lorchenkov, who
“masters the challenge of introducing anecdote into myth” (Prochtenie Magazine),
secures his position as one of the boldest writers on the European literary scene
today.
Lorchenkov depicts Moldova as a devastated
state, where the government is inept and repressive.
Hygiene, living conditions and morale
degrade swi� ly, as the only functioning rule becomes
the law of survival. Life migrates from
the country’s capital, now lying in ruins – an
ideal shelter for stray dogs and orphans – to
the Kasauts prison camp, where the number of
inmates grows daily, with new arrivals of former
civil servants, businessmen, and representatives
of the intelligentsia alike. � e camp
becomes a bleak enclosure for death, violence,
and torture. � e routine massacre deprives life
of all meaning, and convicts desperately seek
salvation in the new religion known as Exodus.
� e doctrine of this religion teaches that Moldavians
are a new chosen people. � eir current
suff erings are a test of faith, with an imminent
reward: the bestowal of virgin land, free from
the fi lth and absurdity of their country.
� e young Lieutenant Petresku drives with his
friend Vladimir Lorinkov, a drunkard and writer
turned museum guard, to the Kasauts prison
camp. Petresku hopes to expose the leader of
the Exodus sect and thus secure a promotion.
Lorinkov, too, has to set out on a journey: in an
alcohol-infused dream, he has seen a vision,
and now Lorinkov knows he will fi nd the
Twelve, whoever or whatever that may be.
Petrika, a former language-college student
who now works on Portuguese tomato plantations,
walks all the way back to Moldova in
search for his true love. � e girl had been deported
to Moldova, pregnant with Petrika’s
son. A� er three years he fi nally reaches the
country, only to fi nd his beloved girlfriend Rodika
scarcely alive, and already the mother of
two. � e newly united family has no other place
to go if they wish to survive. � e Kasauts prison
camp remains the only place where people can
earn a living in the country.
Pleshka, the head of the camp, is deeply in love
with the prostitute Nina, and even keeps a local
poet as his private prisoner to compose poems
in Nina’s honor. On a wild night of debauchery,
Pleshka orders that the poet be murdered, and
sends the poet’s head as a trophy to the capital
instead of the body of the sect’s leader. Pleshka
orders that the latter be killed, too, but it is a
futile act: the leader’s spirit, as convicts insist,
simply inhabits the body of another convict.
Soon, Pleshka himself becomes an ardent follower
of the Exodus doctrine. � is is his only
chance to become a true national leader.
� ey all become the group of Twelve, a dozen
terrorists who seize the world leaders at the
UN General Assembly, voicing a single demand:
the people of Moldova should receive their
promised land.
If Irvine Welsh were to write Saramago’s Blindness,
setting it in Moldova, we would probably
be reading…a diff erent story. Gypsy Camp: � e
Exodus is a noir epic from the author who selfmockingly
calls himself “the only Russian-language
writer in Moldova.” It off ers a rich mixture
of Lorchenkov’s signature prose:
gro tesque, noir humor, an artful balance between
comedy and tragedy, and a masterly
pastiche of modern Moldavian locutions.

SHORTLISTED FOR RUSSIAN BOOKER
AND NATIONAL BESTSELLER PRIZE
Igor Sakhnovsky
Igor Sakhnovski was born in 1958 in Orsk. He studied Russian language and literature at the
State University of the Urals, then worked as a literary consultant and editor for a number of
publishers and magazines. He is co-founder of the weekly newspaper Book Club. His book � e
Happy and the Mad, incorporating the novel � e Vital Needs of the Dead and short stories, won
the 2003 Russian Decameron prize. .� e Man Who Knew Everything was short-listed for the
National Bestseller Prize, and although it was not awarded the fi rst prize, it was the absolute
winner according to readers’ polls. His novel � e Vital Needs of the Dead has been translated into
English, German, and French. Sakhnovski is also the author of two books of poems.
Vagrius, Moscow
2007, 272 pp
Awards:
Winner of the Boris
Strugatsky Bronze Snail
Award
Shortlisted for the Big Book
Award 2007
Short-listed for the Russian
Booker Prize 2007
Shortlisted for the National
Bestseller Prize
Rights sold:
Italy Il Saggiatore
France Gallimard
Serbia Laguna
Bulgaria Riva Publishers
Film rights sold prior to the
publication; the fi lm was
released in 2009; director
Vladimir Mirzoev, starring
Ekaterina Guseva, Egor
Beroev and Maxim Sukhanov
Th e man who knew everything
An unexpected solution to the trite dilemma of a common man up against to the
big world—from Igor Sakhnovsky, prize-winning author of � e Happy and the Mad.
Written in the tradition of A Hero of Our Time and set in a puzzling modern world,
this brilliant new novel is destined to become a Russian classic.
Alexander Bezukladnikov is trapped in total misery:
he can hardly make ends meet; his beloved
wife, sick and tired of poverty, dumps him for a
prosperous ex- sportsman; and there is no
chance for Bezukladnikov to get a better job because
he is unable to keep up with the fastchanging
social reality. � ere is nothing le� to do
but reach for an exposed electrical wire, hoping
for a quick death.
Instead, he gets a new life. A� er being discharged
from a hospital, his scorched palms still in bandages,
Bezukladnikov soon realises that he possesses
a unique gi� : he knows everything. � e
only thing he has to do to get an answer to any
question, be it “how many eggs are there in the
fridge?” or “where can I get half a million dollars?”,
is to ask himself a question. Bezukladnikov
can now see anything that is happening, has
happened or is yet to happen to anyone. He is
supposed to be almighty—but instead, torpid
and inoff ensive, he becomes the prey of thugs,
politicians, women, and international intelligence.
Everybody pursues their own interests.
Some want to use Bezukladnikov, others to kill
him. But Bezukladnikov doesn’t play either their
game or his own. Although comparisons with Superman
are there for the taking, Bezukladnikov
remains a Russian Forrest Gump, unintentionally
betraying the hopes of the crowd. Paradoxically,
all he uses his gi� for is to protect himself from
those who are a� er him.
Employing the plot of a blockbuster action thriller,
the author masterfully creates a classic psychological
story of an ordinary, touching, yet by
no means pathetic person, who tries to assert
his right to a private life.
“Sakhnovski has an innate keen eye, absolute pitch and tact, and – especially so – a deep feeling
of truth.” – Literaturnaya Gazeta
“Th is “euronovel” in a strange way reminds at once of Kurkov, Benacquista and Auster… Th e
wording, secret thoughts, literary allusions, ironic implications have been worked out exceptionally
well.” – Afi sha
Complete French and Italian translations are available

Astrel, AST, Moscow
2009, 380 pp
Rights sold:
France Gallimard
English sample available
Vagrius, Moscow
1999,121 pp
Awards:
� e Russian Decameron Prize
Nominated for Apollon
Grigoryev Literary Prize
Hawthornden Fellowship
2002 to the translator for the
English translation of � e Vital
Needs of the Dead
Rights sold:
World English Glagoslav
France Gallimard
Germany Reclam Verlag
Th e Conspiracy of Angels
Th e vital needs of the dead
Igor Sakhnovsky
An unusual family chronicle about love, time, and auspicious coincidences, from the
author of the prizewinning � e Man Who Knew Everything
Irkutsk, Egypt, Moscow, Hampshire. 16th century
Spain and Flanders, the invasion of the Ukraine
during World War II, evacuation, the Holocaust, a
small, Soviet-era industrial town in the Urals. � is
unusual family chronicle is an intricate crossroads
of far-fl ung love stories.
� e narrator’s grandfather, Roman, is so profoundly
in love with his wife that he goes through
the war without even noticing it. His wife, “Mama
Berta”, misses the train on which she and her
daughters are being evacuated, and three days
later, against all possible odds and the laws of
physics, catches up with it. � e narrator’s father is
crazy about a woman who cannot belong to anyone
– for which reason he leaves her and his children;
yet hers is the name he utters again at the
very end of his life, when he is dying of cancer.
� e narrator’s friend Arseniy confi des a strange
secret to him: there is a portrait of a woman kept
in his family, and this woman appears to every
man of this family before his death. � e woman,
as we eventually learn, is Maria del Rosario, who
either killed herself or disappeared more then two
centuries before. And is it just by chance that
Maria del Rosario bears a great resemblance to a
girl called Dina, an orphan, whose fragile, child-like
What needs might the dead have? Our loved ones stay with us a� er they’ve gone.
Love, death and memory breathe in unison in the fi rst novel by Igor Sakhnovsky.
A boy is growing up in a small Soviet town beyond
the Urals. � ere is a person in his life whose
unobtrusive devotion will stay with him and see
him through all hardships.
� is semi-biographical story of ‘sentimental education’
of a young man in a Russian province
chronicles his life from childhood to university
years, with his fi rst love, to an older woman, his
beauty produces an indelible impression on men?
Surprisingly, in the photos of Dina one never sees
her face: in its place is a white blur. � e gothic
apocrypha about Maria del Rosario transmute
into the story of Mad Juana, medieval queen of
Castilla and Aragon, who was forced to marry a
womanizer, nevertheless fell madly in love with
him, and dragged his dead body around the desert
for four years a� er he died. � e court intrigues
against Juana are succeeded by scenes of a
wretched existence in a small industrial town in
the Urals, where the narrator lived as a child, and
his memories of his father’s death; which then
segue into his joyful and sensual trip around England
with a beautiful red-haired woman.
All these odd yet delicate fragments form a perfect
mosaic of a novel, the intricate pattern of
which seems to be inevitable – indeed, the only
one possible. Igor Sakhnovski, acknowledged
master of psychological prose, tells a story that
is both totally fantastic and profoundly true,
both intimate and multidimensional. � e Conspiracy
of Angels is a novel that insists that, in
this world full of lies and violence, there are still
“too many lucky coincidences”. � is is a novel
about the physiology of miracle, about love,
about the non-existence of time.
attempt to break out of the provincial morass
and the choices he has to make. � e book leaves
the reader sensing that there is ‘nothing more
terrifying, beautiful and fantastical than the socalled
real life’ as the author puts it.
� e book was highly acclaimed in Russia and
fi rmly established Igor Sakhnovsky as one of the
brightest literary voices in Russia today.
«Sakhnovski has a gift for describing what lies beneath the surface; describing what is, in fact,
the fl eeting essence of everything that transpires» – says Lyudmila Ulitskaya, internationally acclaimed
author of Kukotsky Case and Daniel Stein, Th e Translator
«Th e Conspiracy of Angels is an exemplary novel. It contains everything a novel should – love to
the bitter end, history and myth, death and the return from hell… a talented, entertaining, intelligent,
modern, and well- written novel». Openspace.ru
«Th is is a book that sows hope. It’s one of those stories about love, about the lucky and the mad,
at which Sakhnovsky excels». Chto chitat’
«Brilliant, amazing novel that one can’t but list among the greatest achievements of this years’
Russian prose… » Chastny Correspondent
Complete English translation is available

AST, Moscow
2010
608 pp
Sergey Kuznetsov
Sergey Kuznetsov was born in Moscow in 1966. In the late ’90s he became a leading Russian fi lm
and pop-culture critic, and achieved prominence as one of the pioneers of the Internet in Russia.
He has actively contributed to magazines such as Harper’s Bazaar, Playboy, Vogue and L’Offi ciel.
In 2001 he became the fi rst Russian journalist to receive a Knight Fellow scholarship from Stanford
University. Kuznetsov is the author of � e Nineties: A Fairy Tale, a mystery trilogy, � e Butterfl
y kin, a literary thriller; and PG21, a futuristic novel (together with Linor Goralik).
His book Butterfl y Skin has acquired cult status in Russia and has been translated into German
(Heyne) and Italian (Gaffi ), rights sold to Dutch, Polish, Hungarian and Croatian. His story Moscow
Reincarnations was included into the Moscow Noir anthology (Akashic Books, 2010)
Prizes:
Longlisted for the National
Bestseller Prize 2011
New Literature Prize 2011
Finalist of the Big Book
Award 2011
Th e Circle Dance of Water
From “the most talented young Russian author,” according to Arturo Pèrez-Reverte,
comes this extraordinary family saga, an engrossing journey into the fate of
generations and into the depths of the human soul.
T� e Circle Dance of Water is an intricately
patterned portrait of three generations of a
large family. In the narrative there is no division
into primary and secondary characters: each
individual fate bears signifi cant weight and
streams into the common fl ow of the turbulent
history of the 20th century.
� ere’s Nikita Melnikov, 37, who runs a small
aquarian design business. As he soaks in his
young lover’s sweat, Maria, Nikita’s wife, is
verging on despair, crushed by her fruitless attempts
to conceive a child. She sees her barren
body as a vessel for other people’s dramas, living
through the grieves and sorrows of strangers
and opening herself up to the tragedies of
people she could never meet in the real world.
� ey come to her in dreams, these strangers,
and Maria, an unwilling witness, never imagines
that the history of her own family could in
fact be intertwined with these sad stories.
Alexander Brisov, Nikita’s 30-year old stepbrother,
is a gi� ed artist whose once anti-bourgeois
escapist actions have now turned into
frequent drinking bouts. In his bleak, vodka-infused
fears, he is being dragged to the bottom
by monsters and drowned men. He suspects
that he knows who these ghosts are: they are
the victims of the purges, arrested and interrogated
in the 1930s by his grandfather Grigory
Brisov, a member of the Russian nobility who
became an NKVD offi cer to save his own and
his family’s lives.
We also follow the life of Nikita’s and Alexander’s
cousin. Anya, 33, is a single mother who
works as a salesclerk in a shoe shop. A strong
and independent young woman, she takes after
her grandmother, who served as a sniper in
WWII. Shielding herself from attachments with
the motto Be afraid of no one, rely on no one -
and trouble can’t touch you, Anya is caught unprepared
when her new lover off ers to build a
normal life together with her. Time here is like
deep water separating people from diff erent
epochs; yet it is also numerous streams that
fl ow from the past into modern days. Actions
taken by the characters’ parents in the past
echo decisions their children make in the
present - strange parallels seen through the
looking glass of the refracted surface of time.
As the fi nely pitched narrative moves between
generations, locales, and times, so shi� s the
tone of the text. Each character’s story is told
in part by themselves and as imagined by another
member of the family, making for unexpected
twists and discoveries. � e journey into
time and human psychology has also become a
fi eld for literary adventure for Sergey Kuznetsov.
Written in a clear, elegant style, the novel is
fi lled with literary allusions and is rich with cultural
codes. � e range of voices is diverse and
broad- from Rudyard Kipling through Andrei
Platonov and Daniil Kharms, Alexander
Solzhenitsyn and the Strugatsky brothers;
from canonic fi lm noir to Japanese anime. � e
masterfully directed chorus is an outstanding
accomplishment, a pure artistic delight, and
the novel represents a genuine exploration of
culture of the 20th century.
Complete English translation soon available, translated by Andrew Bromfi eld

RUSSIAN BOOKER PRIZE 2008
Mikhail Elizarov
Mikhail Elizarov was born in 1973 in Ivano-Frankovsk, Ukraine. He studied philology in Kharkov
State University and fi lm direction in the Fine Arts Academy. In the late nineties Mikhail worked
as a cameraman.
In 2001 he continued studying in Germany, where he now lives. He contributes to a number of
newspapers and magazines, such as Playboy, GQ, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
Mikhail is the author of fi ve books of fi ction: � e Nails (published in Germany by dtv), Pasternak,
Red Tape, Librarian and � e Cartoons. All of them were nominated for major literary prizes.
Ad Marginem, Russia
2007, 448 pp
85 000 words
Awards:
Russian Booker Prize 2008
Rights sold:
UK, Glagoslav Publications
Denmark, Vandkunsten
Estonia, Varrak
Italy, Atmosphere libri
France, Calmann Levy
Serbia
Bulgaria
Croatia
China
Librarian
Borges meets Sorokin in “an atomic bomb of a novel for the progressive reader,”
from the best-selling author of Nails and Pasternak.
� e Socialist realism novels by Gromov, some
mediocre Soviet author who died in the eighties
totally forgotten, suddenly become a treasure:
it is discovered that the books possess
magic powers. If read intently, they can change
the physical condition, the state of mind, and
psyche of a reader, each book in its own way.
� e boring novels with original titles like “Fly,
Happiness!” or “Silver Valley” are actually the
Book of Power, Book of Memory, Book of
Wrath, Book of Joy, and Book of Strength, and
aff ect a reader correspondingly.
In “Gromov’s” reality, where the books – or
rather the eff ects they produce – become the
most appreciated value, people who once read
a novel of Gromov’s are obsessed with getting
the other ones. � is results in the emergence
of half-mystical, half-military sects called “libraries”
(sometimes in quite unsuitable places,
such as prisons or old people’s homes), each
run by a “Librarian”. In their quest for Gromov’s
books, the libraries cooperate or fi ght with
each other, with kitchen knives and ladles for
armaments and old car tyres for protection,
Over 40 000 copies sold
Complete French manuscript available
Reading material in English available
sometimes with devastating outcomes. � e
ultimate goal of all the libraries is to fi nd the
banned Book of Meaning, the entire edition of
which was destroyed due to Krushchev’s anti-
Stalin campaign.
Oblivious of the existence of “Gromov’s universe”,
a young man named Alexei Vyazintsev
arrives in a provincial town, coming into possession
of a fl at inherited from his deceased
uncle – but instead fi nds himself in the possession
of another inheritance. His uncle was an
infl uential “librarian”, and now Alexei is to take
his place. He will fi ght together with the members
of his library for Gromov’s books, until he
reaches the long-desired one, the Book of
Meaning, to discover the greatest, and probably
the weirdest, secret of all.
Mikhail Elizarov creates shocking descriptions,
picturesque battle scenes, and yearning pathos,
entangled in all-enveloping irony, to draw
the reader implicitly into a world where reading
is the only possible mode of existence for both
individual and nation.

RUSSIAN BOOKER PRIZE 2008
Exmo, 2011
320 pp, 64 000 words
Magic realism
Awards:
Finalist of Big Book Award
2012
Book of the Year by Fantlab
2012
� e Pilgrim (Strannik) Award
2012
Maria Galina
Maria Galina - poet, novelist, literary critic - was born in 1958 in Kalinin (Tver). She graduated from
the Faculty of Biology of the Odessa State University with postgraduate studies in Hydrobiology
and ichthyology. Has a PhD in marine biology, participated in various expeditions, and in 1994 -
under contract to work at the University of Bergen (Norway) - she made scientific studies of
salmon populations. She has been living in Moscow since 1987.
Her first poems were published in the Odessa newspaper Antarctica, and her first poetry
publication in the national press was in the Youth journal in 1990. Since 1995, Galina has been a
professional writer. Her science fiction debut came with the 1997 novel Time of the losers,
published - as were a few subsequent novels - under the pseudonym Max Golitsyn.
From 1998 to 2001 she worked in the department of literature of the Literary Gazette, where
she was in charge of a science fiction section as well as the poetry headline Poetry non-stop.
Author of numerous articles published in the Literary Gazette, New World, Znamya and others,
editor and compiler of the intellectual science fiction series The Other Side for the Forum
publishing house, and a member at the literary critics section of The New World magazine.
Maria Galina is a member of the Moscow Writers’ Guild, has been a jury member at numerous
literary fiction awards, and has worked in the advisory council for the Big Book Award. She has
translated prose (mainly English-speaking authors, including Stephen King, Jack Vance, Clive
Barker, Peter Straub) and poetry (Ukrainian poets) into Russian.
Recipient of the The New World magazine’s Anthologia Award (for the highest achievement in
modern Russian poetry) and the Moscow Count Award. Maria Galina’s works have been translated
into English, Italian and Polish.
Mole Crickets
Mole Crickets, Maria Galina’s highly praised and lavishly awarded novel, begins
with an ironic salute to Neil Gaiman’s I, Cthulhu, and grows into a disturbing tale of
modern men who are apt to compromise their own identity in a doomed chase after
phantasms, in multiplying, self-engulfi ng realities.
Senya Blinkin, a self-conscious, melancholic sociopath
suff ering from numerous nervous ailments
and quirks, is a mediocre literary talent
with deep psychological insight and an inventive
mind. He earns his living through writing
fi ction for private customers. Blinkin involves
his customers in fi ction stories – whether
brand new novels or rehashed classics – and
thus helps them conquer their deepest phobias
and psychological traumas. One customer
marches along with hobbits in a quest to fi ght
the evil lord; another sails with pirates and
saves a beautiful captain’s daughter; yet another
explores cosmic universes. A proper literary
expert, Blinkin fi nds a truly unique fi ctional
reality for each customer. One day, however, he
receives a puzzling order. An infl uential businessman
asks the writer to concoct a detailed
background for him. � ere’s nothing in his childhood
as an orphan that he wants restored and
preserved – so why not write him a new life? A
family tree with stories and anecdotes and artifacts
and photographs, a life he could truly experience.
� e farther Blinkin proceeds in this
task, the more real becomes his fi ctional invention.
Soon the line between the real and the irrational
blurs, and the metaphysical world
changes places with the real one, as the door
to an alien horror is thrown open.
� e inscription “Cthulhu is coming,” with a
countdown of days, appears in a puddle at the
doorstep, followed by a gothic looking teenage
girl who makes herself at home in Blinkin’s
house. A few artifacts bought in a fl ea market
for his customers are linked to Blinkin’s own
family, and his father eagerly welcomes a replacement
of his failing son in the successful
businessman. � e writer’s neighbor, an eccentric
researcher, reveals a theory that Achilles
never was a Greek hero, but a chthonic monster,
the son of the evil ancient goddess Hecate,
and there are signs of his imminent comeback.
� e neighbor gets arrested soon a� er, charged
with murdering his wife; but the writer thinks
he, too, can see the signs.
Maria Galina writes in a signature style, weaving
genres, the real and the metaphysical,
phantasmagoria and pastiche, into her story.
� ere are no alien monsters in Galina’s text, yet
the horror leaks through the thin fi lm that covers
her fi ctional world. Maria Galina is primarily
interested in the monsters within us, and she
investigates the human soul through a looking
glass of myths and lore with singular brilliance.

“Almost all her work, independent of
the level of rhythmicality of the form, is
located in a strange, in-between world,
in the gap between the fantastic and the
realist text. Nevertheless, it results not
in a moribund homunculus with poor
coordination and incoherent speech,
but an absolutely vital, multi-faceted
creature with a broad spectrum of
possibilities.” Chascor
The novel warms up and buzzes; how to
interpret this beautiful music, however,
is unclear. Strange business, strange
family ties, strange neighbors, strange
thoughts, strange love; the plot lines run
all over the place, but the novel doesn’t
fall apart. The subject sticks together
due to the spittle of the narrator, which
contains a special secretion that makes
words cohere. Lev Danilkin for Afisha
Maria Galina has written a strange book.
In places frightening, in places funny, in
places hard to comprehend. This is a sad
story about people who are weak and
closed up in the shells of their worldviews,
who try in every way possible to brighten
up their gray lives. Knigi X
Her current novel resembles a Rorschach
blot, and every reader will bring
Mole Crickets
something different away from it. One
person will read a story about loneliness
and madness; another about chthonic
powers gradually taking over the world;
another about the secret meaning of
blood ties. Or, at worst, about the seamy,
dark side of the writer’s craft. For Galina,
this theme would seem to be quite a
familiar one. Itogi
Through all this chthonic magnificence,
simple human truths break through: it’s
too easy to get lost in the game. Madeup
relatives turn out to be much more
pleasant than blood relatives. The world
of illusion is more attractive than the real
world. Psychologies
The reader who wants to find a world
that is familiar, but magical and as yet
unexplored, would do well to turn to the
new prose of Maria Galina. openspace.ru
One of the few works with a very long
and bitter-sweet aftertaste. Novyi mir,
No. 5, 2011
Maria Galina’s novel is about this, as
well—about how one can conjure up
or charm any reality, with a conspiracy,
an incantation, the power of the
imagination, or a desperate dream; and
even the most innocent intellectual
Maria Galina
literary or psychological game can lead to
unpredictable consequences. vedomosti
Serious adult prose, for repeated reading
and unhurried reflection. mirf.ru
Anyone can write a boring,
incomprehensible novel. Maria Galina
has done something improbable—she
has written a compelling, spellbinding
book that no one can fully understand.
Chitaem Vmeste
In Mole Crickets the consciousness of the
human being and the world in which he
lives is dissected so deeply, in so many
layers, that the skeleton of existence is
revealed—again, the myth is understood
here not only as a theme or metaphorical
system, but first and foremost as a
particular mode of thinking, a mode of
being [ . . . .] The global misalignment
of the world and the human being is
alarming and unsettling, and generates
that instability of reality around which
the novel is built. Mikhail Nazarenko

Eksmo, Russia
2009, 250 pp
65 000 words
Awards:
� e Marble Faun Award
2010
� e Portal Prize 2010
� e Silver Caduceus Award
2009
An unexpected twist on a theme as old as
the world. Little Boondock is aimed at the
adult reader. The novel is discomfiting; it
can be sad, painful, and even repugnant,
which distinguishes it favorably from
its saccharine, soppy, self-aggrandizing
counterparts in the fantasy mass market.
It falls completely within the tradition
of great prose. Oleg Divov, bestselling,
prize-winning sci-fi and fantasy author.
The plot boils down to a journey by the
protagonist to the other side of the river
and a meeting with the one he was so
desperate to find—but this is a journey
in a non-dimensional, hollow time, a
journey in which every step, every choice
can mean its opposite, and the nearer
one gets to one’s goal, the more one
risks losing oneself. Slovosfera, a literary
portal.
Little Boondock
Maria Galina, like Stalker from the Strugatsky brothers’ true classic Roadside Picnic
and the eponymous fi lm, guides her readers through the strange reality of a Soviet
Russian province in this dramatic, ruthless quest in search of our true selves.
Inna and Evgeniy meet by chance on the road to
the small, remote Russian village of Malaya Glusha
(the Russian name can be loosely translated
as Little Boondock). Inna, 38, comes from
this area; she works as a receptionist in a local
clinic. Evgeniy, fi ve years her junior, has just arrived
from Moscow. He is a top civil service offi
cer in the ministry of sea transportation.
� ese two would never have met under ordinary
circumstances. Even if they had, they
would not have found common interests or topics
of conversation (whether her expert knowledge
of bird species, or his vast collection of
foreign fi lms). But they both missed the bus,
and while hitchhiking were picked up by that
same car—which broke down midway through
the journey. Now they must walk through the
fi elds to Little Boondock. She is sweating in a
cheap synthetic blouse and fl uff y house slippers
that she puts on instead of her heels, and
carries a heavy suitcase (probably with gi� s for
her aunt on this long overdue visit). He carries a
lightweight, brightly colored backpack, a typical
tourist from the capital exploring Russia’s
backwoods provinces.
� e heroes stay overnight in a neighboring village.
Evgeniy fi nds a hospitable refuge in the
home of a teacher of local history and folklore,
a recent widower. � eir quiet cozy talk over tea
on a warmly lit veranda is interrupted by the arrival
of the hostess at sunset. Evgeniy chooses
to ignore the light whiff of damp earth clinging
the teacher’s wife and explains it away by her
healthy, earthy wholesomeness. In the morning
he wanders to a local cemetery, only to discover
a headstone bearing the name of the kind
hostess. Evgeniy sets off , leaving his things behind.
He is not urged on by fear; it is hope that
Here the past becomes the place of
action—the same as the world of the
dead in Little Boondock or the port
city in SCE-2. I repeat, it is not a time,
but a place; and this place, which many
of Galina’s readers still remember, is
peopled with demons. OOpenspace.ru
We see an insane, desperate attempt
to rectify something, to restore love—
literally from the next world. Little
Boondock is a story about submersion,
in which there is a metaphor of a
half-forgotten time, when a country
befuddled with counterfeit progress
sinks into a primitive, lawless existence.
Knizhnaya vitrina
The territory of personal happiness
available to Evgeny and Inna is only a
murky interim world, born of egotism
and passion, which they mistakenly
perceived as genuine love. Chaskor.ru
gives his feet wings.
Maria Galina
Evgeniy is not surprised when he spots his fellow
traveller in the woods. He can now reveal
the true reason for his journey – he wants to
return his wife, who died in a tragic accident together
with their toddler, a few years before,
both run over by a truck on a highway. Inna confesses
that she is going to Little Boondock to
recover her son, who died in action in the Afghan
war.
� e heroes will have to endure exorbitant trials
and live through truly metaphysical horror. Finding
themselves inside their worst nightmares,
they will even have to kill a person during one
dramatic episode of their quest. Armed with
love or guilt, they both get to Little Boondock
and cross over the river. � ey both change
along the way, but fi nally reach their destination
and fi nd their loved ones. Yet who waits for
them behind the river? In the world of the dead,
Inna fi nally understands that she tortured her
son with her love, actually pushing him away to
war. � e modern Orpheus, too, learns to adjust
to a painful realization: it was not only love that
he had felt toward his dead wife. It is then that
the heroes face the most diffi cult choice they
have to make.
Maria Galina has written a ruthless parable.
She excels in bringing together common folklore
with a keen investigation of human psychology.
Galina uses the mechanisms of ancient
myth to reveal passion, impotence, and fear in
her characters. In the melancholic pace of Galina’s
writing, every detail and word is charged
with extra meaning, turning this fantastic quest
into a literary tour de force.
Poet, woman of letters, erudite and
healthy cynic, Maria Galina creates
strange stories at the junction of the
genre of philosophical fantasy, beloved
by the Russian intelligentsia, and the
women’s version of magical realism
a la Lyudmila Petrushevskaya. In the
two stories included in this book and
palpably echoing one another, one can
discern a thriller, a fairy tale, and social
allegory. Galina very deftly combines
genre constructs with a popularizer’s
mission, fantasy with philosphy, cynicism
with penetrating nostalgia. Expert
This dramatic story, familiar as the ancient
Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice,
begs to be staged in order to recall its
simple, but powerful maxims—that the
capacity to love must be accompanied by
the ability to forgive, and the capacity to
remember is as important as the ability to
forget. Sergey Shickarev

Eksmo, Russia
Paranormal thriller
2009, 250 pp
65 000 words
Awards:
� e Marble Faun Award
2010
� e Portal Prize 2010
� e Silver Caduceus Award
2009
CSE/2
Galina creates a brilliant and original
world, peopled with vibrant, funny, and
recognizable characters. Chascor
The characters are sometimes absurd,
because they are ordinary people. But
laughing at them is distressing. CSE-2 is
not The Nightwatch or Ghostbusters; nor
is it a satire on the mores and conventions
of the late-Soviet Stagnation. It is a
story about relationships—and about
fate. About life, which is seldom happy.
Knizhnaya vitrina
In the unlikely event that John Lindqvist had written a script for Ghostbusters and
set it in Soviet Russia, the result might have been this: CSE/2 – a suspenseful paranormal
thriller in the period of Soviet Stagnation.
1979, a Russian provincial seaport town. A� er
failing her university entrance exams, the romantic
17-year-old goose-girl Rose gets a job as secretary
in the port’s Center for Sanitation and Epidemiology.
� e offi ce is called CSE/2, but Rose
can’t fi gure out how it diff ers from their neighbour’s
offi ce, CSE/1, which is in charge of inspection
of cargo for parasites, viruses and alien bacteria.
To Rose, people in both offi ces look just the
same and face the same problems, typical for
the time of Soviet Stagnation: shortages of
goods, endless lines in shops, depressingly unsettling
living conditions, personal mishaps, and
a host of common minor confl icts at work.
Elena Sergeevna Petrishenko, head of the offi ce,
is unhappy. A single mother with a rebellious
young girl (her spoilt child has grown up too fast,
it seems), Petrishenko also takes care of her bedridden
mother suff ering from Alzheimer’s. � e
endless routine of red-tape at her job during the
day does little to brighten her life. Rosa’s coworkers
include inspector Katyusha, a sugary
lady in her mid-40s who wears pink hand-knitted
sweaters, and Vasya, a university graduate in
ethnographic studies, another supervisor as well
as head of the CSE Communist party’s organization.
Katyusha does not seem to be pressed for
time. � e only thing that breaks her routine of
knitting and eating candy is fortune-telling, with
nearly all co-workers listed as her customers.
Vasya, too, resembles any other graduate—always
ready to tease the romantic young girl
wearing green polish on her nails. Rose, however,
feels strangely uncomfortable sitting next to
Katyusha, and in the end she has to wall herself
off from her colleague with an otherwise useless
bulky typewriter. And though Rose generally accepts
Vasya’s jokes about her nail polish, she
hates to fi le his inspection reports, mottled with
cryptic letters.
A bitter and satirical account of the quotidian ex-
This “soft” fantasy about “mental
parasites” as yet unknown to science
is, perhaps, a unique attempt to come
to grips with what happened in the
Soviet Union during its last decade. The
demise of an empire, as we know from
history, is always accompanied by a rise in
paranormal powers, dances of death, and
the hunt for astral witches . . . NG ExLibris
Galina depicts an inhuman, demonic will
erupting through the mundane, personal
psychological motives of ordinary
people; and thus amplifies the sense of
Maria Galina
istence of ordinary Soviet citizens then transmutes
into a paranormal suspense thriller when
the police discover a mutilated corpse in the
city’s port, followed quickly by another corpse, at
the stadium. Both victims have had their legs disfi
gured, as if a maniac had roasted them in a fi re.
� e party and city offi cials accuse Petrishenko of
negligence, in this crucial time leading up to the
Olympic Games, and demand that their offi ce detect
and deactivate the monster. � e specifi cs of
CSE/2 activity then become obvious – they battle
with alien matter of non-organic origin—simply
put, they battle with demons.
Petrishenko and Vasya succeed in classifying the
evil spirit on the loose in their town as a unique
threat: an ancient North American god of hunger
and the harvest. � e spirit’s power grows with
each new victim, and this period of shortages,
when people are reduced to virtually hunting for
food, is perfect breeding ground for the ancient
god. While CSE/2 team waits for the arrival of
Vasya’s university professor, a powerful warlock
whose powers could match those of the monster,
they can only stand by and watch as the
panic grows and the citizens storm and loot the
stores. When Rose senses a grim, baleful look
fi xed on her back for the fi rst time, she cannot
even imagine that this will plunge her into the
heart of dramatic events that far outstrip those
of her favorite adventure novels.
Galina’s writing resembles social realism, but her
fi ctional reality is both pessimistic and gruesome,
with lavish doses of sarcasm and bitter
wit. � e horror in Maria Galina’s story comes
from the anguish of quotidian life in the so-called
Epoch of Soviet Stagnation, rather than from the
surreal threat of menacing alien creatures. Unhappy
and o� en out of place, the characters in
the novel search for an impossible miracle in
their dull, daily routines, opening the gateway for
truly chthonic terror.
total horror (as in Hitchcock films, where
the expectation is always more horrifying
that the actual event). Izvestia
Maria Galina, who commands equal
respect among lovers of fantasy and
faithful readers of “thick” literary
journals, has yet again confirmed her
status as a strong prose writer, balancing
on the boundary between fantasy and
phantasmagoria with the refinement of a
consummate tightrope-walker.
Piterbook

Yana Vagner
Yana Vagner was born in Moscow in 1973 into a bilingual family. Her Czech mother came to Moscow
in the 60s to study Russian language and literature. Yana graduated from Moscow State
University with a major in management and has worked as an interpreter, an anchorperson on
radio, and a logistics manager, which allowed her to travel extensively throughout Africa, Europe
and Latin America. Yana Vagner lives with her husband, teenage son, and three dogs in their country
house on the outskirts of Moscow. � e author’s blog is defi ne_violence.livejournal.com.
Selected Bibliography
2012 – Vongozero. Book Two – novel
2011 – Vongozero – novel
2011 – Sunny Mood, short story anthology – selected short stories
2010 – Fox Honor, short story anthology – selected short stories
Вrama, road- story, post-
apocalyptic novel
Exmo, Russia, 2011, 448pp
Prizes:
Longlisted for � e New
Literature Prize 2012
Nominated to the National
Bestseller Prize 2012
Rights sold:
Sweden Ersatz
Slovakia Ikar
Czech Euromedia
France Flammarion
Film Rights:
Art Pictures, Russia
English sample available
Vongozero
In her debut post-apocalyptic thriller Yana Vagner refers simultaneously to Stephen
King’s � e Stand, Cormac McCarthy’s � e Road and the popular TV show Man vs.
the Wild – and yet the author concocts a strikingly visionary survival story in its own
right. Written at the time of the H1N1 fl u epidemic and coming out as weekly entries
in Vagner’s blog, Vongozero – a haunting and arresting tale of a young woman who
attempts to survive with her family during the throes of a pandemic – had already
won thousands of readers before its publication as a book, setting off a heated auction
among major Russian publishers.
What begins as a fl u epidemic rapidly transmutes
into a national catastrophe; but in the
fi rst days there’s little panic. Anya, the story’s
narrator, 36-years old, was married three years
before the events and now resides with her husband
Sergei and her teenage son Misha in their
country house outside of Moscow. � ey remain
oblivious to the scope of the danger until the authorities
send out troops to close down the major
cities for entry, dooming their inhabitants to a
swi� yet painful death. Panic triggers violence,
looting and devastation.
Anya and Sergei have both le� family members
behind in Moscow, and while Sergei succeeds in
rescuing his ex- wife with their 3- year old son,
Anya’s mother gets infected and dies in the city
under siege. Anya’s father arrives just prior to
the appearance of the fi rst looters in the settlement,
a direct warning to the family. � ey choose
to fl ee to a shabby getaway house at the Vongozero
lake near the Finnish border, where Sergei
had stayed a few times on hunting trips. Born
out of necessity, the expedition grows into eight
adults and three children in four crossovers,
loaded with belongings and fuel. Mortal danger
draws together this weird and ill- assorted group
of fellow travelers, speeding to the north of the
rapidly deteriorating country.
Scheduled as a 48-hour journey, the road trip
turns into twelve days of nightmare, dreary an-
ticipation of grief, worry, and struggle. As this
highway trip escalates into a test of ultimate
survival, the fellow travelers have to fi nd the
strength and resources not only to fi ght against
the looming external dangers, but to face the
deepest corners of themselves. � ere are no
guarantees, no rules, and no truths outside
those that help them to survive. � e road challenges
the limits of human nature, measuring
compassion against the thirst for living, the
strength of family ties against jealousy and exasperation
– and forces each traveler to pay the
utmost cost for survival.
� e sweeping avalanche of a road story stops
short at the destination point: a tiny shelter on
the shore of the ice-covered Vongozero lake in
the freezing taiga forest. � e protagonists now
have time to weep for those who failed to reach
the fi nal point and to attempt to build out of the
ruins and rubble a new routine, a new code, a
new life, and possibly new selves.
As horrifying as one’s worst nightmares, the
novel reads as a very plausible scenario. Yana
Vagner demonstrates outstanding writing skills
and deep psychological insight as she sets out
the simplest and at the same time the most
complicated question before her characters and
readers: what does it take to remain human in
the face of mortal danger?

Selected quotes
“Th is is a road story, a running- fromthe-approaching-wave-story,
a simple
yet unusual genre. Nearly 450 pages
of a white (it’s winter) road with few
turnings in the plot, but with many
twists and turns of the route and the car
wheels. Over a thousand kilometers of
a nonstop buzz of panic. Did I mention
the avalanche? – without this symbol the
review wouldn’t have been complete.” –
Vyacheslav Kuritsyn, the national prize-
winning author of Th e Siege Novel and
Th e Month of Arcachon.
Vongozero
Readers’ quotes from the blog
Th e novel’s strong point is that there’s
no falsehood in it. All the observations
about human nature strike the reader as
defi nitive and psychologically true. Th is
is defi nitely beguiling.
Th e novel is so gripping that I keep feeling
relieved every time I fi nish a piece
and realize that it’s fi ction, and that I live
here, in the real world.
I basically just can’t get how you do this.
Everything looks so simple and so deep
at the same time. Th e story refuses to let
you go, as if it’s really happening out
there and your blog is the news source
following the events. From time to time
I catch myself remembering an episode,
and I have to remind myself that this
happened in a novel, not in real life.
I have never been a fan of this genre. But
it’s 4 am and I am reading your work,
which has been published in excerpts
in your blog, and I cannot stop. I only
got distracted once to get some tea and
make myself a meal. It’s so gripping and
so visual – as if I’ve just fi nished watching
a movie. As if I have met all these
people! I cannot wait to read the sequel.
Yana Vagner
I have never read anything so captivating,
gripping and penetrating. Your
characters become fl esh and blood, as
if I know them personally. And I catch
myself at wondering whether I have an
emergency kit, warm clothes, a sleeping
bag, and food that can be stored away.
I know what attracts me most – the fact
that you don’t judge, leaving the judgment
up to the reader. Th ere’re no good
or bad characters, there’s no evil or
good, they are put into believable situations
where they have to make decisions
and take action, just like any of us would.
I’m not really interested in the storyline
- it’s just that you write with such certainty
and rhythm that I cannot stop
reading.
You create such a dense atmosphere and
plot that it makes a very cinematographic
impression. Reading it is like watching
a fi lm – a fi lm with sounds and smells.
Your characters are all very diff erent
from each other, and the text makes me
worry not just for them but for myself - if
anything like this were to happen to me,
how would I act?
I believe now that I know what true
horror is – it’s grey, indiff erent, and inevitable.

Dmitry Savochkin
Dmitry Savochkin (1978), born in Kharkov, Ukraine, grew up in Zaporozhye region and now commutes
regularly between Kiev and Dnepropetrovsk. He studied psychology and sociology at the
Dnepropetrovsk University, and did postgraduate courses in court psychophysiology at Axciton
Division Academy (Tampa Bay, Florida). Dmitry Savochkin has worked as a gatekeeper, a porter, a
school teacher, a journalist, a criminal investigator, and an editor. He now heads the HR department
at a big international consortium.
Savochkin is the author of the novel Markscheider (2009), favorably received by critics who compared
the novel to “� e Fight Club in a mining face” and unanimously called it “the most original
novel on industry of the year”. Dmitry is married and is the father of two children.
Savochkin is now at work on a new novel.
Eksmo, 2011, 416 pp
Road story, thriller, mystery
Cane Wolves
An arresting road story, a gripping examination of the mystical side of WWII history
and the shadowy experiments of the Nazi special service – Cane Wolves is an original
take on a popular theme.
Klyost – “black digger” in the recent past, who is
in high demand, and also a bell caster, with limited
clientele in the present – arrives in Odessa on
the invitation of a Ukrainian mogul. Klyost has no
idea of the oligarch’s intentions, but he would not
turn down the substantial fee that the businessman
is off ering for the possibility of a meeting.
� e oligarch off ers Klyost a solid reward for a
two-week mission: Klyost has to track down his
daughter, who committed suicide shortly before
these events. � e businessman is convinced that
his daughter’s disappearance is linked with a
Nazi soldier’s token, half of which he has in his
possession. � e token’s second half should bring
Klyost to the oligarch’s daughter. Klyost is intrigued:
the token does not fi t into any regimental
specifi cations familiar to the black digger,
with his years of experience. Klyost needs help in
his investigation, so he hires a young journalist
from a local scandal sheet to look into the missing
(dead?) girl’s connections.
Together with his new assistant, the sly tomboy
Verba, Klyost takes off on a helter-skelter journey
following the key events of WWII throughout the
territory of Ukraine. � eir search for a Nazi offi cer
in a secret regiment of the � ird Reich, offi cially
lost in action in Ukraine, and for a girl who used to
escape with ease the surveillance by her father’s
persistent bodyguards, will bring characters
from Kiev’s vibrant nightclubs to one “Lost Unicorn”
hotel; from a village house where the German
offi cer stayed during the war, which now
features a library of probably all existing translations
of only one book (Max Frisch’ Gantenbein),
to a cane thicket in dense forests. � e mystery’s
investigation introduces Klyost and Verba to a
sprawling cast of memorable characters. � ere’s
an unusual patient in an asylum, who does not
grow old and claims he was lost, yet shall soon be
found; an elderly man living in a house in the
woods who knows more about the mysterious
Nazi offi cer than he admits; and even a fortuneteller
who reveals their karma to them, yet refuses
to intervene or correct it. � e unusual investigation
turns into a survival quest, putting Verba’s
life at risk. Klyost has to fi nd out the truth behind
the link between the missing Nazi offi cer and the
Ukrainian oligarch’s daughter – or else the girl,
whom he loves, will die.
Dmitry Savochkin has written the best suspense
thriller to come out in the Russian language for
years. A treat for fans of the TV shows � e X-Files
and � e Fringe, Cane Wolves is highly sophisticated
fi ction exploring realms that readers don’t
even dare to imagine.
“A gripping storyline; Nazi symbolism, parapsychology, Ukrainian folklore, werewolves … each
paragraph demonstrates the author’s remarkable pitch and ear for language. [Savochkin] obviously
knows how to write fi ction – and scripts, too” – Afi sha

SOPHISTICATED SCI-FI, FANTASY
Anna Starobinets
Anna Starobinets is 32 years old. She is a journalist and contributor to a number of established
publications, such as Expert and Russian Reporter, writing on cultural issues. She is
also a scriptwriter. � e Awkward Age, her collection of short stories, has been translated into
a number of languages, including English (Hesperus). She is also the author of the novel Refuge
F/A (2007); Cold Spell (2008), a collection of short novels; � e First Squad. � e Moment
of Truth (2010), a tie-in; as well as two books for children. All of her novels were nominated for
the National Bestseller Prize.
Anna lives in Moscow and is married to Alexander Garros, the well-known author of international
bestseller Headcrusher.
«Th is is one of the most stunning debuts to come out of Russia since Victor Pelevin: hip, funny, angry, and dark as hell. With
one foot in the high literary camp and the other in genre (but never generic) horror, Starobinets establishes herself as the 21stcentury
Gogol, mapping a twisted road to the dark and absurd heart of Russia.» Booktrust
«Th is girl seems to have an absolute handle on what reality actually is.» Afi sha
«She writes with delicate verbal grace, never losing it to a whine.» Ti me-Out
AST, Moscow
April 2011, 286 pp
Sci-fi
Rights sold
UK Hesperus
Spain Nevsky
Italy Atmosphere Libri
Sweden Ersatz
Prizes:
Nominated for the National
Bestseller Prize 2012
Th e Living
A brave new dystopia from the “Russian horror queen,” who this time steps into the
territory of George Orwell and Aldous Huxley.
A� er a global catastrophe called the Great Reduction,
the number of people living on Earth has
become fi xed, remaining a constant 3 billion.
� is stability is based on the common notion of
continual reincarnation. � ere is no death, as the
main social byword suggests – just a brief
“pause,” or “ninety seconds of darkness.” A� er
these ninety seconds a person is conceived
again. No wonder all humankind is considered to
be one composite organism called � e Living.
Every person has an in-code that keeps track of
information about all their previous incarnations.
Family and country are now of no importance.
Every person can be reborn anywhere on the
planet, issuing from their previous incarnations
rather than biological parents. Society is global,
and attachment to parents and children is denounced
as a deviation. All people (or, rather, all
the particles of � e Living) in this society are connected
directly from the brain to the social network
(called Socio), where they can surf on various
levels simultaneously. Needless to say, the
fi rst level – that of reality itself – is barely used,
and usually ignored.
Complete English manuscript available
� e particles of � e Living live happily and die
happily, according to a government-determined
schedule, and it seems that nothing can threaten
this stability. Yet… there is one man born
without an in-code (i.e. without previous incarnations)
– a spare human being. His birth increases
the number of � e Living by one, which threatens
the harmony of � e Living. So who is Zero?
� is is the question Zero himself is desperate to
answer. From early childhood he shows deviations.
He is attached to his mother; he is loved by
pets, who normally are scared of � e Living. After
his mother’s death he is sent to the correction
center where kids with bad “karma” are
kept. � ere he makes friends with Cracker, who
actually invented Socio in one of his previous incarnations.
Cracker helps Zero to fl ee and to
eventually fi nd out that this whole comfortable,
logical, and fair world rests on lies. It is probable
that even the proverbial “incarnation” is just a
result of astute manipulation. Zero soon gets to
know that the slogan “� ere is no death” is
meaningless – actually, it’s all there is.

Novella and short stories
Amphora, St. Petersburg
2008, 248 pp
Novella and short stories
240 pp
Rights sold:
UK Hesperus
Italy isbn edizioni
Poland Prozhynsky
Bulgaria Colibri
France Mirobole
Spain Nevsky
Cold spell
Anna Starobinets
A new collection of mesmerizing novellas and short stories from the acclaimed author
who has been compared by literary critics to Stephen King, Edgar Alan Poe and
Ray Bradbury, in turn.
In Stay-at-Home, the opening novella of the collection,
a brownie (a house-spirit) is desperately
trying to save an old Moscow fl at, where he has
lived for decades, from deterioration – the granddaughter
of the late owner has rented the fl at out
to a Korean sect. While he is tormenting a poor
Korean cat in the present, the tragic events that
took place in this fl at during the Stalinist years
unfold in the brownie’s recollections, revealing
very unexpected things.
No less staggering are the family secrets in the
seemingly childish plot of Cold Spell, the novella
that shares its title with the book. Sonia, a fat
miserable girl whose father takes her to a snowmound
for skiing every winter Sunday, writes letters
to an imaginative sorceress living in the
snowy hill. � e story proceeds as a psychological
Th e awkward age
family drama – until the sorceress indeed starts
to fulfi ll Sonia’s wishes, even the most frightening
ones… What really lies beneath the snowmound
is rooted deeply in the past of Sonia’s
family.
In the eerie short story Scorching Heat, a “Father
Frost for Hire” arrives at the New Year’s Eve celebration
to entertain a young girl, but instead
fi nds a forty-year-old woman wearing a short
dress, with a lollipop in her mouth.
In Straight Ahead and Le� , a dying husband is alienated
from his wife. He lives between two
worlds, and time runs faster in one of them than
in the other – so he knows what his wife is going
to do or to say at every moment.
Translation rights on the fi rst collection of short stories � e Awkward Age sold
to UK, Italy, France, Spain, Poland, and Bulgaria.
Stephen King meets Franz Ka� a in the riveting stories by a new sensational Russian
author. � e author plunges the reader into a world where the reality shi� s and
fl exes. � e off -beat and original stories, nominated for the National Bestseller Prize
2004, are reminiscent of such mystery gurus as Steven King and Shirley Jackson
and at the same time follow the tradition of the classical Russian storytelling.
A boy turning into the anthill is the striking metaphor
of the awkward age developed in the
head title. An ant-queen gets into his head
through the ear when he is six and starts setting
the ant colony inside his body, believing that
such symbiotic existence can open the new horizons
for the ants. � e story sounds in three
authentic voices: the boy’s mother’s, his twinsister’s
and his own. � e most stunning part of
the novella is the boy’s diary. His voice, so touching
in the fi rst entries, little by little turns into
the collective voice of the ants living inside him
and making him obey their needs. Having started
as a family story about a divorced mother
with two kids who have to live through the awkward
age, the narrative switches unexpectedly
to a nearly Ka� aesque one.
Shape-shi� ing and blurring the boundaries between
the real and the illusionary is the technique
being perfected in the short stories. Playing
with the confl icting emotions, making the
Complete English manuscript available
reader experience the mixture of disgust and
tenderness towards the protagonists, Anna creates
the authentic, if o� en strange, characters:
Two lovers in the apocalyptic Moscow settings,
neither of whom knows that they are both dead.
An agent working for a “coincidence management”
agency, who turns out to be chasing himself.
A lonely guy who cherishes a saucepan forgotten
in the fridge and thus turns it into a
loveable monster. A man traveling between two
towns unable to fi gure out which one of them is
real. A child who kills his mother for not keeping
the rules of his secret game.
� e madness in the stories is entangled with the
ordinary; the nightmare dissolves in the mundane.
� e prose style is unadorned and clear.
Anna Starobinets’ imagination and remarkable
grasp of reality at its most inexplicable leaves us
wondering: is the world really something we
have always believed it to be?

AST, Astrel, Russia
444pp
sci-fi
THREE TITLES NOMINATED FOR THE
NATIONAL BESTSELLER PRICE
Andrei Rubanov
Andrei Rubanov, journalist by profession, became known to the Russian readership in 2006,
when in one of the major time-out magazines Afi sha there appeared a review on his fi rst selfpublished
semi-autobiographical novel Do Time, Get Time, about self-perfection in prison. Translation
rights on for his works are sold to UK, Poland, Bulgaria, France, Spain.
Within a week a� er this review he received the off ers from all the best Russian publishers. In two
months the novel was short-listed for the National Bestseller prize. His second novel – Great
Dream was published a year later. Both Great Dream and All � at Glitters were nominated for the
National Bestseller prize in 2009. Andrei lives in Moscow and runs his own small business.
«Rubanov in 2011 is what Aksenov was in 1961, Erofeev in 1971, Limonov in 1981, and Pelevin
in 1991 – smart, intelligent, with a keen ear and a healthy portion of impudence; a narcissist with
self-irony. � is makes him no mere “big writer,” but a truly national treasure.» – Lev Danilkin for
Afi sha
Andrei Rubanov is the only writer to make it onto the long list of the National Bestseller Prize
2011 with three titles.
Awards:
Nominated for the National
Bestseller Prize 2012
Finalist of the Strugatsky
Fantasy Award 2012
Gods of Gods
With his tenth novel, the nationwide bestselling author Andrei Rubanov has cra� ed
an intelligent helter-skelter thriller, a modern bio-punk version of H. G. Wells’ � e Island
of Doctor Moreau and Pierre Boulle’s Planet of the Apes. Rubanov confronts
his characters with two competing ideologies in order to examine modern civilization
as a battlefi eld between violence and love.
A bio-engineered spacecra� , the Biom, is transporting
over 6,000 convicts to a planet where
the detainees will be serving their terms.
Among the convicts is Marat, a former pilot
charged with hijacking numerous spacecra� ,
and Zhilets (a nickname meaning the Living
One), a hardcore criminal sentenced for life. A
carefully premeditated plan of escape is implemented
by Zhilets, with the aid of Marat’s
unique skills as a pilot. � e two fugitives land
on a planet not listed in any space atlases, leaving
the rest of the passengers fl oating in space,
confi ned within the Biom’s swi� ly decomposing
body. � e landing is rough, and Zhilets, immobilized
with a broken spine, cannot fully enjoy
the promised land.
� e Golden Planet is a true paradise: its tropical
climate ensures the lavish growth of all
forms of life. Sweetness is, literally, in the air:
the water, earth, local plants, animals, even the
pagans’ sweat all taste and smell of chocolate
and caramel. Yet the local population does not
eagerly welcome the strangers. Marat’s fi rst
encounter with the aboriginal people of the
planet challenges his deeply held conviction
that control and authority are only established
through love. � e neolithic pagans interpret
sympathy as weakness; the unprepared Marat
has to abide by the commands of Zhilets and to
fi ght back. � e fi rst bloodshed proves productive,
and Zhilets imposes his authority through
blunt algorithms of the divide and rule type.
Marat seeks a compromise between ruling as a
tyrant and retaining a humane sense of morality.
In a few years, the handicapped old criminal
and the genius pilot, le� with only wild animals
to tame, completely reconstruct the life on the
planet: treated as deities, they rule over dozens
of tribes in a swi� ly erected City-on-the-Shore.
� e visit of a female vagabond implodes into
their blissful routine. � e woman takes them to
the legendary Uzur, a source of life energy. � e
revived Zhilets launches a meaningless massacre
as he explores the limits of what the Golden
Planet has to give, and only Marat can stand in
his way to ultimate power.
In Gods of Gods the fascinating inventiveness
of bio-engineered life forms, the intricate detail
of both the societies and habitats, and the
complex, believable characters, all amount to a
fabulous story. Rubanov is at his best here,
turning a sweeping interplanetary adventure
fi rst into a drama of survival, then into a de� ly
cra� ed farce, and eventually into a thoughtful
examination of human nature.

AST, Astrel, Russia
2011, 352 pp
Rights sold
France Flammarion/Ombres
Noires
Awards:
Shortlisted for the National
Bestseller Prize 2011
Th e psycho agent
Andrei Rubanov
� e Psycho Agent, Andrei Rubanov’s breakthrough a� er his debut prison novel
Do Time, Get Time, supersedes ready-to-hand comparisons with Houellebecq and
Wolfe and their social denouncements in this truly “big Russian novel” on love and
punishment.
Psycho Agent is a term coined by the author to
identify a person who engages in the psychological
suppression of another person for his own
benefi t: an “agent” or initiator of psychosis, a psychological
“cannibal”. Such is Kirill Korablik, a.k.a
Cactus, a 40-year-old convicted murderer, released
on parole a� er only eighteen months of
his prison term, who bursts into the life of an ordinary
young couple.
Mila Bogdanova, 28, knows that she is smart and
beautiful, and is determined to get whatever she
desires. With solid professional credentials as a
top accountant in a small Moscow-based fi rm,
she has recently established having a happy personal
life as a major priority. Her partner Boris
loves cars, as well as his own private business in
auto tuning – and, naturally, his girlfriend Mila.
Boris knows he can provide a good income for
the two of them even when business is bad: he
rents out a large fl at in Moscow’s city center.
With their friends – Masha who lavishly spends
her days between partners and their wallets; and
Masha’s latest boyfriend Dima, a bright and wellto-do
representative of the modern Moscow cultural
beau monde – they merge and mingle, contributing
to the formation of the new Russian
middle class. � e “Buoyant Russians,” as the author
dubs them, these young people are prepared
to live life to the hilt, though they can hardly imagine
what this will mean for them.
� e two couples celebrate the New Year in a
country house. Kirill, a friend from Boris’s childhood
years, pays a short visit with the purpose of
giving him an extravagant present: the photograph
of an old Jaguar selling at bargain basement
price, and the fi rst installment for the deal.
On returning from the country a� er their short
holiday break, the excited Boris and Mila discover
that someone has broken into their fl at. � e rob-
bery sets in motion the couple’s underlying problems.
Mila does not want to stay in the defi led
place and moves out, while Boris refuses to take
action, instead sinking into a vodka-induced alcoholic
haze. A growing number of unscrupulous
competitors, his mother’s progressive alcoholism,
and even the wedding with Mila planned for
the coming summer all drag Boris down into a
deep depression.
Kirill, on the other hand, shows up shortly therea�
er to report that the robber has been detained,
and that their belongings will soon be restored to
them. Kirill is benevolent, supportive and kind.
Mila, however, suspects that the gracious friend
who has suddenly taken control of their lives may
have secret motives. Mila resolves to get to know
Kirill better. � eir swi� ly developing relationship
escalates into a ruthless duel, and stakes are
much too high. Mila realizes that Kirill threatens
not only the peace and love of her family, but that
their very lives are in danger.
“� e theme of the novel is biblical: “thou shalt not
covet thy neighbor’s wife”. � e agent in the novel
is hardly Prince Charming. � e narrative centers
on the battle between Beauty and the Beast; between
a modern young woman who fi ghts for
her happiness, and a man – a broken 40-year-old
fossil from the troubled Soviet epoch,” says Andrei
Rubanov.
In this essentially pop-lit novel, Andrei Rubanov
masterfully draws a gallery of vivid, utterly believable
characters, and keenly observes the slightest
shi� s in dramatic psychological development.
Rubanov’s blunt, somewhat publicist
narrative examines truly Dostoevskian questions
from a surprising new angle, with a fresh twist
that adds volume and topicality to the vast panoply
of popular literature of the 21st century.
� e fi rst printing of 7,000 copies sold out
within the fi rst two weeks a� er its publication

AST, Moscow
2009
320 pp
Foreign rights
Spain Planeta/Minotauro
Serbia Solaris
Chlorophilia
Andrei Rubanov
People turning into vegetation is the premise of this penetrating dystopia from Andrei
Rubanov
Moscow, the 22nd century. Saveliy Gertz works
as a journalist for � e Very Best, a major Moscow
weekly. � e magazine writes about those Russians
who continue working while most of their
compatriots produce nothing, but mostly consume.
Money is no longer a problem: Siberia is
rented out to the Chinese, and the Russians live
on the rent, cheering themselves up with the slogan
“You don’t owe anyone anything”.
� e strangest thing, however, is that Moscow is
overgrown with giant grass. Each stem is 300
meters long. It is impossible to cut it or to root it
out: it grows back instantaneously. What’s more,
the pulp of this grass is a powerful psychostimulant
that causes pure joy, without, it seems, any
consequences. � e drug is consumed in many
forms: the rich take it as a sublimed concentrate,
and the slum dwellers devour it raw.
� e grass totally changes the metropolis’s social
structure and value system. � e supreme value is
the sun that is blocked out by the rampant grass.
One’s social status depends on the fl oor where
one lives. � e ninetieth fl oors are occupied by the
elite; the sixtieth by the middle class. � e twentieth
are true slums, and the people who live there
are called the pale.
As for other kinds of values, the pale grass-eaters
don’t really have any. � ey can lie still all day long,
basking in a feeling of pure joy and watching � e
Neighbors, a popular reality show. Consuming
the grass is technically against the law, but is not
English sample available
prosecuted... until it is discovered that the seemingly
harmless grass gradually turns people into
itself: into plants, that is. And the fi rst people to
start literally striking root are not the pale, as one
might have expected, but the upper-fl oor residents,
who consume pure joy in concentrated
form.
Among them is the protagonist Saveliy Gertz,
and his pregnant wife Varvara. � eir story evolves
against the chilling background of the unenviable
future of Moscow. When people begin to disappear,
and the lamentable truth of their disappearance
is revealed, the urban thriller morphs into a
western. Fearing that Varvara will give birth, not
to a healthy baby, but to a “little green man,” the
couple fl ees from Moscow to the countryside.
� ere, in a special colony, doctors and volunteers
are trying to save the grass-eaters and prevent
them from turning into the plants. At the same
time, they must risk their lives trying to get along
with the savage locals. Saveliy, who now o� en
wants to just stand still basking in the sun, faces
a diffi cult choice: to put down roots, to stop
thinking, to turn into a plant completely — or to
struggle to remain a human being.
Rubanov is one of the most fearless of contemporary
Russian writers. An established master of
realistic fi ction, mostly based on true stories, he
has created a penetrating anti-utopian vision that
spares no one. � e reader is poised on the cusp
of curiosity and terror — so ingenious, and so terrifying
at the same time, is this brave new world.

AST, Moscow
2010, 352 pp
Eksmo, Moscow
2008, 384 pp
Rights sold:
France Flammarion
Earth of life
Andrei Rubanov
In his sequel to the nationally acclaimed Chlorophilia Andrei Rubanov draws a bitter
and strikingly evocative panorama of the country’s life a� er “the extermination” or
“rooting out”.
It’s been only 20 years since the grass disappeared
or was rooted out, as the authorities
claim, yet Denis Gertz never lived it diff erently.
� e consumption-based economical system of
the country collapsed, the government moved to
a new capital built around lithium sources, and
Muscovites had to learn to survive on scarce allocated
goods supplies. For the young man this
implies living in a small apartment on the fl oor up
to the twel� h level (no water or electricity supply
provided above); doing public labour on the demolition
of skyscrapers; stopping by a local hole for
some cheap vodka, tea and sourcrout; buying local
food and clothing in a next-door supermarket;
and delivering goods to those few crazy or outcasts
who choose to stay on the upper levels of
the city’s landmarks. Making 100 fl ights in one
“run” pays well – at least, Denis can provide for
his mother’s treatment of grass-eating post effects.
New slogans of the Muscovites diff er drastically
from “You behold to no one” of the times of prosperity:
“Make things, not money” and “Spare the
savings”. � ose few who spend time and money
in restaurants instead of contributing to the society’s
well-being, who choose delicatessen to sim-
All that glitters
ple nutritious products, or fashion clothing to
rough leather and cotton items from a local store
are disapprovingly called the decomposed. � e
latter however prefer to leave the city and get to
settle in the new capital – � e New Moscow – a
city under the dome built in the heart of Siberia.
� e dome protects the authority, business, science
and cultural elite from any external aggression
– be it a climate change or unwanted immigrants.
� e price for a comfortable, rich and safe
life is a personal transparency. All citizens are being
implanted personal ID fi les that are open to
public. Authorities can add anything into a fi le,
from information to feelings that range from remorse,
shame to euphoria or respect – a vast
fi eld for manipulation.
Denis has other concerns than choosing � e
New Moscow over his native city, a satiated yet
transparent life over challenging and simple lifestyle
in the Old Moscow. His girlfriend le� him for
his best friend and his mother gradually gives up
to her illness. Until one day together with his
friend he gets hold of what everybody believes to
be a myth – a grass seed. Now Denis Gertz
knows he can change it all. � e seed has just to
be planted.
A high-pitched criminal drama from the celebrated author of the prison novel that
stirred up the Russian literary scene, Do Time, Get Time.
� e life of wine-merchant Matvei Matveev is no
less ordinary than the life of anyone who started
a business in early nineties in Russia. A safe fl at, a
smart wife, and a nice job seem to be all he has,
and all he needs.
But the business is not doing as well as it seems;
in fact, it’s a mess. Matvei’s only employee is a
percussionist who plays in a band called Los
Anormales every Saturday. His ex-partner is a
banker, ultimate workaholic, exploiter, and a person
heartless enough to refuse credit to Matvei
when he desperately needs it.
Still, Matvei’s life is no less ordinary than anyone’s.
Until…he dies. Or at least that is what he
thinks has happened. A� er he disappears, his
wife Marina hires police captain Svinets to fi nd
her husband. Meanwhile, Matvei, hidden in the
basement of a country house, is forced to recollect
the episodes of his life that brought him to
this condition.
Masterfully, with wit and compassion, Rubanov
creates an entire gallery of psychological portraits
of Russians in the 1990s. Bold entrepreneurs
and their wives, corrupt politicians, drugusers,
criminals and cops — their jealousies and
revenge are the pivot of this terrifying and convincing
plot, in which there is death even a� er
death.
Nominated for the National Bestseller prize 2009

Dmitry Kosyrev
Dmitry Kosyrev is the fi rst Russian writer to adopt a Chinese pen-name. In Russia, the author is
known under the name of Master Chen, fi rst used in the Hong Kong media in the 90s. Born in 1955,
Dmitry Kosyrev studied Chinese history at Moscow State University and the Nanyang University of
Singapore. Since late 1970s Dmitry Kosyrev has been actively involved in the International Politics
section of the national media, writing for the leading newspapers (Pravda, Rossiiskaia Gazeta, Nezavisimaia
Gazeta) and news agencies. He is a Member of the Board of the Foreign Policy Association.
With his features and columns on wine, food, cigars and travel, Dmitry is a regular contributor
to special editions. An expert on China and the Orient, he has lived in various parts of Asia, including
the places described in the novels. He is happily married with two daughters and lives in Moscow.
Olma Media Group, Russia
Astrel, Russia, 2010, 2012
Genre: espionage, thriller
352 pp
Rights sold:
English language rights
Russian Life Books
«Here comes the fi rst Russian cross-cultural
novel! Master Chen awaits the fame
of Boris Akunin – he, too, wrote a “clever”
detective for readers to appreciate author’s
special treatment of culture, particularly
culture of the Tang dynasty in the
8th century. Master Chen is in love with
his subject, not blindly so, yet with acute
sensitivity and vigilance». Vedomosti
«Th is is a mysterious debut writer coming
up with a brilliant adventure! I opened
the book – and shot out as a cork into
a medieval China! Th e PET MONKEY
which I read in a gulp is indeed written by
a master!» Novaya Gazeta
«Th is is a great intellectual action novel,
which does not fall under genre defi ni-
Pet Foal of the House of Manyakh
� is long-awaited new book in the series about the adventures of Nanidat Manyakh,
omniscient and omnipotent medieval spy, introduces author Dimitry Kosyrev’s
thousands of fans to a turbulent, dark time in the history of the Great Byzantine
Empire.
Constantinople in the 8th century is the heart
of another great Empire that defi nes the geopolitical
situation in the Medieval world. � ree
global centers — the Chinese, Arab, and Roman
(Byzantine) Empires — are connected
through the overland trade route known as the
Great Silk Road. Silk traders become the most
powerful agents, twisting global political interests
to suit the purposes of shadowy organizations
that hide behind cash-laden silk-trading
houses. Such is Nanidat Manyakh, a Sogdian
(the term for a modern Uzbek) by origin, who
gallops into Constantinople on the back of an
ill-tempered black bolter as leader and tutor of
a group of inquisitive young Romans.
tions – it is both an espionage detective,
a romantic love story, and a historical
novel». Utro.ru
«A totally successful debut! Th is is a solid
prose with a well organized plot, capacities
for bonus historical facts and a clear
style which does not tire readers with an
excessive stylization “a-la epoch”». Expert
magazine
«An intricate poplit on the Orient».
Vedomosti
«Th is is a sad story about man’s resources,
when the only thing he wants in the
chaos of war and riots is to fi nd and save
one woman. Th is book is a rare if not
unique example for the modern Russian
literary scene, when the narrator speaks
Most unusually, there are three women in the
group of travelers: the bewitching Zoe, head of
the expedition; Danielida, a charming mime
and actress who also demonstrates remarkable
skill as a warrior; and Anna, interpreter for
the “barbarian” Nanidat. Together with the
young Romans and a eunuch servant, they
cause quite a stir in the villages on the way to
the capital of the Empire. Locals cannot but notice
that with the group’s arrival, terrifying
sounds ring out from the forests, sounds that
no living creature — with the exception of a
dragon — could produce. Dragons do not exist,
Nanidat’s young pupils insist. Nanidat, however,
knows that they actually do.
about the legacy of Prophet Muhammad,
about the Prophet’s great book, the Koran,
about the fi rst caliphs, their wars,
constructions and poetry - with a candid
interest and sympathy». www.aif.ru
«In this original combination of poetry
and hard-boiled thriller lays the charm
of the novel. His books, obviously a light
reading, are immaculate in their historical
research and authenticity and literally
explode with a rare and oft en shattering
information that is not known even for
the most educated readers». Diplomat
«…As a result there appears a bouquet
of entertaining genres mixed on the basis
of detailed knowledge of the subject».
Russkiy Zhurnal

Olga Morozova Publishers,
Astrel, Russia
2007, 2012
447 pp
Genre: espionage, thriller
Rights sold to:
World English: Russian Life
Books
«Th is is a mysterious debut writer coming
up with a brilliant adventure!» Novaya
Gazeta
«Master Chen never gives direct answers
– readers, as with Umberto Echo’s
Publishers: Astrel, Russia
2006, 2007
560 pp
Genre: espionage, thriller
Rights sold to:
World English: Russian Life
Books
Bulgaria: NSM-Media
Pet Hawk of the House of Abbas
Dmitry Kosyrev
� is brilliant prequel to Master Chen’s successful debut novel establishes the author
as a major voice in the genre, in the company of such authors as Boris Akunin
and Orhan Pamuk.
Set in Iran during the middle of the 8th century
AD, one of the most turbulent periods in world
history, the novel tells the gripping story of a
peaceful silk trader who is transformed into the
character readers have come to know and love
in PET MONKEY OF THE HOUSE OF TANG – a
virtually omniscient, omnipotent, and irresistible
super-spy.
� e silk-trading house of the Manyakhs, which is
also a dreaded private spy organization that has
manipulated global politics for several centuries,
cannot possibly stay aloof from a civil war breeding
right on the borders of Samarqand. � e centuries-old
legacy of Prophet Muhammad, by
then a huge global empire, begins to fall apart,
and the last caliph of the Umayad Dynasty cedes
power to a new dynasty. Rumors fl y that a beautiful
golden-haired woman appears on battlefi
elds to molest, torment and kill wounded warriors.
� e woman is always guarded by a pack of
skillful warriors – probably same ones who have
murdered many infl uential politicians and trad-
Name of the Rose, can test his knowledge,
make their own assumptions and
compare past with present. Manyakh’s
adventures bring to a distressing conclusion
– the world of Th e East is not
just complicated, it is also ultimately
Pet Monkey of the House of Tang
ers across the country, going unpunished as they
disappear or kill each other a� er every assault.
� e descriptions of the obsessive, demoniac
woman bear a striking resemblance to an Iranian
princess whom Nanidat grew up with. Nanidat
reluctantly accepts that he must set off in pursuit
of the love of his youth, to save her from this
sudden madness. � e Manyakhs are troubled by
her possible connection to the dreadful sect of
the assassins. � ere is no time le� for doubt
when the house of the Manyakhs comes under
attack and Nanidat has to fl ee to save his life.
� e violent chase brings him to Merv, the headquarters
of a young and ambitious rebel. Nanidat
is yet oblivious of the hardships, intrigues and
momentous outcome the future has in store for
him.
A gripping, action-packed narrative, lyrical love
scenes and ingenious sexual exploits, and panoramic
battles blend in this historical tour de force
to make a genuinely rewarding read.
� is book sets a unique precedent – as an example of how an expert’s ambition to
write a historical espionage thriller can meet with resounding success.
Set during one of the most turbulent moments of
Chinese history, 755–756 AD, the novel tells a
taut and compelling story of the sudden and still
unexplained rebellion of a prominent regional
commander of the Tang empire. � e uprising toppled
the emperor and caused the death of the
most famous woman in all of Chinese history,
Yang Guifei. � ese events had a drastic impact on
the history of Chinese civilization, as the empire
was cut off from the Central Asian overland trade
route known as the Great Silk Road.
Writing with convincing authority and imagination,
Master Chen expertly reproduces authentic
locales of medieval China with a restrained profusion
of engaging facts and living details of the
time. � e author’s greatest accomplishment is
the introduction of a new super-spy hero to vie
with the long-beloved, ancient predecessors of
the Bond kin. A Sogdian (the contemporary term
for Uzbek) by origin, Nanidat Manyakh seems
larger than life. He is an expert in business, war,
medicine, and diplomacy, a lover of poetry and
inertial; and modern strategists who
aim at implementing war campaigns in
Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran, should carefully
study the history of the Umayad
and the Abbas Dynasties, before it is too
late». Ti meOut
women; he is here to twist the politics of the empire
for the needs of a shadowy organization that
hides behind an all-powerful and cash-laden silktrading
house. � e Emperor’s concubine Lady
Yang, an infamous beauty and an authority on the
art of love, falls for Manyakh, and the master spy’s
involvement threatens someone dear to him. � e
realization comes too late – Manyakh loses control
over the plot which seemed to have been so
carefully designed. An avalanche of revolt and
blood-shed ravages the empire, sweeping away
the hero’s own life with it.
A fi ction-writing debut, this is a literary accomplishment
that commands attention. Characteristic
genre components – explosive action, fi erce
confrontations, ingenious sex scenes – combine
in the novel with a daring treatment of well-documented
historical facts and famous personalities,
evocative fragments of Du Fu’s poetry, and Shaolin
philosophy, to result in a powerful and engaging
must-read for espionage professionals, experts
on China, and general readership alike.

«THE MOST MYSTERIOUS RUSSIAN WRITER» –
ECHO OF MOSCOW
Svetlana Martynchik
Svetlana Martynchik, who has created both a male author and protagonist of her work in Sir Max
Frei, was born in 1965 «in Uzhgorod or Nurnberg» as she claims. She is an artist, poet and author
of a number of extremely acclaimed literary projects. Max Frei has compiled several books of
modern prose, fairy-tales and has also championed young, talented Russian novelists. She now
lives in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Series of ten volumes
Amphora, Russia
1999–2004
Fantasy, detective
Volume 1: 640 pp
Rights sold:
� e Stranger
World English: � e Overlook
Press, Norway: Schibsted,
Sweden: Ersatz, Germany:
Blanvalet/Bertelsmann,
Italy: Mondadori , Spain:
Minotaur, Czech Republic:
Triton, Bulgaria: Infordar,
Poland: Zysk I S-ka
Volunteers Of Eternity
World English: � e Overlook
Press, Czech Republic:
Triton, Bulgaria: Infordar
Simple Magic � ings
World English: � e Overlook
Press, Czech Republic:
Triton, Bulgaria: Infordar
Mazes of Echo
� e fascinating and amazingly funny adventures of Sir Max, a noble, kindly and
lighthearted knight who appears in the magical world of Echo will appeal to readers
both young and old.
� irty-year-old Max fi nds himself in the world of
Echo, whose inhabitants can all master diff erent
magical powers. With his eff ervescent humour,
dead-pan logic and a newly-discovered
talent for magic, Max soon fi nds his place in
Echo. As head of Echo’s night-duty secret police,
Max’s job is to investigate cases of illegal
magic. Indeed, his work is never a drudge: his
daily routine is to fi ght with illegitimate magicians
and monstrous creatures from other
worlds. � e marvelous Sir Max easily wins over
the inhabitants of Echo – the omniscient Sir
Juffi n Hally, the eff ervescent and lighthearted
Sir Melifaro, the composed and dangerous Sir
Shurf Lonli-Lokli and the absent minded Sir Luukfi
Pants, a connoisseur of the art of cookery
and the master of disguise Sir Koff a Yoh and
the astonishingly beautiful Lady Melamori
Blimm. � e fantastic stories of their adventures
and misadventures, richly spiced with
Frei’s amazing humour, have struck a chord
with a large readership.
“We didn’t acquire Max Frei’s wonderful contemporary epic Th e Stranger because it was foreign
literature or because it came from Russia. It’s just a marvellous book that has sold everywhere”
Overlook Press
“If Harry Potter smoked cigarettes and took a certain matter-of-fact pleasure in administering
tough justice, he might like Max Frei, the protagonist of this fantasy novel. Well-written, wellpaced
grown-up fantasy with a strong dose of reality”. – Kirkus Reviews
Bestseller
Over 1 million copies sold
English translation available

ESPIONAGE THRILLER TURNED FILM
Paris Weekend
Eksmo, Russia, 2006
Populiarnaya Literatura,
Moscow, 2008
320 pp
Rights sold:
US – Enigma Books
Italy – Nikita Editore
Bougaria
Serbia
Sergei Kostin
Sergei Kostin is a spy novelist, an expert in espionage history, and a television documentary
fi lm maker. Kostin is currently working on a new novel featuring Paco Arraya.
A feature fi lm based on Kostin’s book Bonjour, Farewell has been put to screen, directed
by Christian Carion’s with Emir Kusturica as a leading actor.
First printing of 100,000 copies of each title by Populiarnaia Literatura Publishers
Complete text in English available, published in US by Enigma Books, 2008
Two reprints on publication of each novel by Eksmo
A major national promo campaign by Populiarnaia Literatura Publishers
Paris Weekend
Sleepless in Afghanistan
Ram-Ram
Espionage and personal drama provide a winning mix in the masterful Russian version
of John Le Carre.
Paco Araya, KGB operative of Spanish origin
(his father was a Spanish communist who had
immigrated to the Soviet Union), runs a travel
agency in Manhattan, where he has been living
for over twenty years. Araya has little concern
for the current political situation. A “mole”
since the age of 20, Paco is fi nancially independent
on the Bureau – which is how he refers
to the FSB (former KGB) – and carries out
operations in his own way, by his own means.
� e Bureau does not abuse its special operative
and calls out Araya only for missions that
demand his urgent participation and expertise.
� us, a balance is achieved – the Bureau has an
operative for “missions impossible”, while
Paco can feel that he is involved in Russia’s national
aff airs and get an occasional adrenaline
rush.
As the three novels unfold, the reader gets to
know Araya’s dramatic background, and at the
same time witnesses the intricate schemes of
covert operations involving international intelligence.
Set in diff erent parts of the world, the
missions are rendered in such plausible detail
that the reader never doubts the author’s fi rsthand
experience.
High-pitched narrative, fi ne psychological observations,
brilliantly captured geographical diversity,
and expert knowledge of espionage
make for a ground-breaking literary event in
Russian spy fi ction.
In Paris Weekend, Araya must fi nd a courier
agent who failed to arrive at a rendezvous at
the appointed time. � e missing agent was
supposed to be carrying an unknown, but extremely
dangerous substance. � e Libyan
counter-intelligence is apparently involved. It
looks as though Araya won’t be having a relaxing
weekend in Paris a� er all. � e dangerous
mission is put in jeopardy as Paco discovers by
accident that a man he has wanted to kill for
many years happens to be within arm’s reach.
Sleepless in Afghanistan unfolds over nine
nights in January 1999 in Talukan, a town set
in the territory of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan.
Araya arrives in Moscow with a request
for retirement. Instead, he is sent on an
operation with two nearly impossible tasks.
� e fi rst mission is to fi nd Russian General Tairov,
kidnapped with his family by the Chechens,
and kept, according to the Bureau’s sources,
by the Taliban somewhere in Afghanistan. � e
bonus mission requires that Araya use the
skills of the� . Russia would receive unthinkable
benefi ts from a Saudi prince in exchange
for the exclusive “Dragon’s Tear” emerald. � e
precious stone belongs to Ahmad Shah Massoud,
an infamous leader of the Northern Alliance
forces, who refuses to sell it. Posing as s
a TV journalist with an unsuspecting crew,
Paco Araya has only one week to carry out
both missions – before the end of Ramadan,
the time of armistice between the Taliban and

Sleepless In Afghanistan
Eksmo, Russia, 2006
Populiarnaya Literatura,
Moscow, 2008
344 pp
Rights sold:
US – Enigma Books
Italy – Nikita Editore
Bulgaria
Serbia
Ram-Ram
Populiarnaya Literatura,
Russia, 2006
312 pp
Rights sold:
US – Enigma Books
Italy – Nikita Editore
Bulgaria
Serbia
the Mujahideen. No one from the crew speaks
the local languages, and the only source of information
is a Pakistani offi cer, a Bureau defector.
He was captured by the Mujahideen and is
being held prisoner in Talukan.
Araya’s new mission, in the novel Ram-Ram, is
set against the breathtaking backdrop of India,
where he travels to investigate the strange
death of his old friend Roman Liakhov. Liakhov
had been the most promising student in their
class, and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel
– only to retire a� er the collapse of Soviet
Union and immigrate with his wife to Israel. Rumors
in the Bureau have it that Liakhov was
recruited by the Mossad. Araya has had no
news of his friend for ages, until he receives a
report from the Bureau that Liakhov’s body has
been discovered in a shelter in Old Delhi. � e
mission gets more complicated, as Paco trav-
Sergei Kostin
els in the company of Masha, a Hindi-speaking
agent – according to legend, Masha will be
Araya’s wife. Yet Masha seems to have no intention
of building a friendly relationship with
her colleague. � e operatives have no information
as to the possible motives of Liakhov’s
murder or his mission. � ey have to act as
“bait” by following Liakhov’s route and actively
calling attention to their own presence. Weird
coincidences follow the traveling agents from
the start – three young fellow-travelers from
Israel turn up at the same hostel in Old Delhi,
and the leader of the group, a bright, charming
girl, is apparently eager to get to know Paco
better. � is does not make Paco’s relations
with Masha any easier. Soon the agents become
a target for real weapons. � e pursuers
rise to the bait – and Paco is set on a course of
fi nding out who the real hunter is.
Praise for Sergei Kostin’s spy novels:
«Th e author is obviously familiar with the routines of espionage, and not just through Ian Fleming’s
books. Permeated with numerous fl ashbacks, rich with cultural allusions, the novels
are clearly penned by an intellectual author. [Th anks to Sergei Kostin] we are witnessing a minirevolution
in the Russian espionage thriller, of the sort Boris Akunin set in motion ten years ago in
the realm of the detective novel”. Expert magazine
«[In Sergei Kostin’s novels] one fi nds not only original and compelling intrigues, constructed
in the spirit of the high-profi le standards of creative writing programs, but also well-written dialogues,
unconventional language, and fi ne imagery. Th ese are solidly built and fi rmly stitched
novels, and they deliver a fascinating read. Th ough the time when we lavishly bestowed odd
titles to writers (“Kostin is the Russian Graham Greene”) is gone, we have to acknowledge that
Sergei Kostin is very close indeed to Graham Greene». Lev Danilkin for Afi sha
«Th ese are powerful, professional, solid novels that change our vision of the genre». Knizhnaia
Vitrina

POST-APOCALYPTIC
ROAD STORY
Anna Arutunyan
Anna Arutunyan’s work has appeared in USA Today, � e Christian Science Monitor, � e Nation,
Foreign Policy in Focus, and � e Moscow News, where she is senior political reporter. She is author
of � e Media in Russia, published by McGraw-Hill in 2009. As an expert on Russian media
and politics, she has lectured at Tampere University in Finland and at Michigan State University.
Her deep knowledge of Russian current aff airs, coupled with her understanding of what it is like
to live and work in Russia gives her a unique opportunity to explain and reveal Russian power
from an inside perspective.
Anna Arutunyan lives in Moscow with her husband and daughter.
Non-fi ction, Current Aff airs,
Social History, 2012
ca 100 000 words
Foreign rights:
Denmark Lindhardt og
Ringhof
Sweden Ordfront
Finland Atena
Poland Zysk
Estonia Ajakirjade Kirjastus
Lithuania Kitos Knygos
Latvia Zvaigzne
Bulgaria Prozoretz
Czech Euromedia Group
Slovakia Ikar
Romania Meteor
Th e Putin Mystique
No mere biography, this timely, courageous and provocative book from a bilingual
Russian-American journalist, living in Russia for the past ten years, does not seek
to answer the o� -examined question “Who is Vladimir Putin”, but rather provides
groundbreaking research into what in contemporary Russian culture, economy and
her people’s psyche has allowed Putin to become what he has become.
Why was Vladimir Putin’s return to the Kremlin
more of a coronation than a re-election? And will
things really change in Russia if the current protest
movement succeeds in toppling Putin’s autocratic
regime? Anna Arutunyan, the Senior Political
reporter at � e Moscow News sets forth an
insightful and brave journalistic investigation of
the dynamics of the relationships between the
Russian people and their ruler.
To understand Russia’s future, one must understand
her past. � e Putin Mystique depicts a neofeudal
world where iPads, WTO membership, and
Brioni business suits conceal a power structure
straight out of the Middle Ages, where the Sovereign
is both demonic and divine, where a man’s
riches are determined by his proximity to the
Kremlin, and where large swaths of the populace
resort to pseudo-masochism interrupted by
bouts of revolt. � e key paradox uncovered in the
book is one that will astonish readers: supreme
power in the Kremlin is actually far weaker and
less vigorously exerted than many people hunger
for in modern Russia.
With an approach at once journalistic and personal,
this book draws on over one hundred interviews,
numerous case studies, and lively yet
scholarly examinations of existing writings to
paint an o� en chilling portrait of Russian autocracy
from below. � e Putin Mystique reveals the
shocking and previously unexamined fabric of life
that is at the base of Russian power – from the
impoverished worker who appeals directly to Putin
for aid, to the businessmen, security offi cers
and offi cials in Putin’s o� en dysfunctional government
who look to their leader for instruction and
protection Spanning the last 12 years of Putin’s
rule, � e Putin Mystique also includes fi rst-hand
analysis of the protest movement that has recently
challenged his hold on power to shed light
on the changes that may await Russia.
Putin’s seeming omnipotence – and his recent return
to the Kremlin for a term that will last at least
six years – has confounded the West and much of
the world. Not a time-sensitive biography nor an
attempt to reveal alleged “secrets” about Putin
which may or may not be entirely factual, � e Putin
Mystique goes underneath the politics to uncover
how social and economic factors have
molded the second President of the Russian Federation
into a classical autocrat, reviving the ancient,
feudal relationships that have historically
governed Russia in the absence of the rule of law.
� e Putin Mystique places the contemporary situation
into the context of fi ve centuries of autocratic
power in Russia, revealing unexpected historical
parallels which will surprise readers and
illuminate their understanding of what’s happening
in Russia and why.
Ms. Arutunyan persuasively demonstrates that
despite the recent hunger for change, the protest
movement is but part of a vicious circle of despotism,
corruption and revolution – a Catch-22 that
seems to predispose society towards autocrats
with personalized, rather than institutional rule.
� e book exposes the conspicuous weaknesses
of the current system, where all initiative is handed
over to the leader in cases where he is willing to be
involved or to unreliable and o� en ethically-challenged
regional vassals in cases where he is not.
With Putin’s future uncertain and Russia’s path
once again in turmoil, Anna Arutunyan uses her
fi rst-hand, expert knowledge of national aff airs
and politics to create a compelling exploration of
Russia today, providing an urgent warning to policy
makers and business leaders and a fascinating
work of social science and modern history for anybody
interested in understanding Russia, her people
and the inevitably autocratic leader at the
country’s helm.

WINNER OF THE BIG BOOK PRIZE &
BOOK OF THE YEAR 2010
Pavel Basinsky
Pavel Basinsky was born in 1961 in Frolovo, near Volgograd. He studied at Saratov University and
at the Maxim Gorky Literary Institute in Moscow. A prolifi c journalist and author, Basinsky has
excelled at a number of genres, from scholarly monographs to experimental novels. Basinsky
holds a PhD in Comparative Literature, has sat on the jury of several major Russian literary prizes,
such as the Russian Booker, the Alexander Solzhenitsyn Prize and the Yasnaya Polyana Prize, and
is the Cultural Editor of Rossiiskaia Gazeta. He is married with two children and lives in Moscow.
Pavel Basinsky’s book Leo Tolstoy: Escape from Paradise, came out in July 2010 and since then
has been reprinted 10 times. According to sales fi gures from some of the largest Russian bookshops
Escape from Paradise ranks among the top ten most popular books of the year 2010.
Awards:
2010 – � e Big Book Prize
2010 – Book of the Year
2008 – Shortlisted for the Big Book Prize
1998 – � e AntiBooker Prize Ray of Light Award for literary criticism
Selected Bibliography:
2011 – Passion According to Maksim. Gorky: Nine Days a� er Death
2010 – Leo Tolstoy: Escape from Paradise
2008 – Maxim Gorky: Myth and Biography
AST, Russia
2010, 637 pp
155 500 words
Awards:
� e Big Book Prize 2010
Book of the Year 2010
Shortlisted for the Big Book
Prize 2008
� e AntiBooker Prize 1998
Foreign Rights:
Germany Projekt Verlag
Brazil Laya
Portugal Laya
Slovenia Cankarjeva Založba
Bulgaria Riva
Latvia Kontinent
Italy Nikita
Israel Schocken
Hungary Atlantic Press
Romania Editura Humanitas
Leo Tolstoy: Escape from Paradise
Basinsky’s book traces Tolstoy’s life a� er his fl ight from Yasnaya Polyana, his childhood
home and literary sanctuary, up until his death.
One hundred years ago, 82-year-old Count Leo
Tolstoy, Russia’s greatest literary genius,
shocked the world by suddenly abandoning his
vast ancestral estate, Yasnaya Polyana – and
his family. His disappearance on a freezing winter
night immediately became an international
sensation.
During Tolstoy’s last days in Astapovo in November
1910 he was quickly surrounded by a
camp of journalists and devotees, living in tents,
with daily reports about his state of health sent
to the international press via an especially installed
telegraph line, with added commentaries
and interviews with the most prominent
Russian writers, bishops, governors, etc. � us,
what the 82-year-old man had intended as the
start of his new life as a wandering ascetic became
a world media circus involving Russia’s
most powerful forces: the clergy, the secret police
and the Supreme State Authority, headed
by Tsar Nicholas and Stolypin.
Since then, the circumstances surrounding his
departure and the death of the man called the
Greatest Writer of All Time gave rise to much
speculation...
2008 – A Russian Romance or � e Life and Adventures of John
Polovnik
2006 – A Humble Aristocrat
2006 – � e Family as a Form of Mysticism
2004 – � e Prisoner of Moscow
2002 – Writer Par Excellence
1998 – Russian Literature of the Late 19th and Early 20th centuries
and the First Emigration
1993 – � emes and Characters
Escape from Paradise presents not just a new
version of Tolstoy’s secret fl ight from Yasnaya
Polyana and his sudden death, but a vivid and
in-depth reconstruction, based on archival and
documentary evidence. We follow Tolstoy’s escape
step by step, learning the reasons behind
his tragic family situation and the secrets surrounding
the signing of his will. � ese events are
placed in the context of Tolstoy’s fascinating life
story, key moments from which are reconstructed
and explored.
What was the real reason behind Tolstoy’s fl ight
from Yasnaya Polyana? Was it “spiritual heroism”,
a sign of weakness or just plain panic and
fear of something – or someone…? Was the
fl ight connected to Tolstoy’s last will, signed by
Tolstoy in the strictest secrecy in the woods
near the village of Grumont?
To answer these and many other questions the
author investigated all the available literature on
the subject including the archives of the Tolstoy
Estate Museum at Yasnaya Polyana. � e book
is richly illustrated with rare photographs from
these archives.
10 print runs within a year, over 50 000 copies sold
Bestseller: top 10 bestselling books of the year
English, Polish & Portuguese samples are available
Complete German translation is available

Selected reviews
Pavel Basinsky has written an absolute
bestseller. His well-researched tale of Tolstoy’s
escape is a road story, a thriller and
a psychological drama all in one. – Maya
Kucherskaya, Vedomosti
Basinsky performed no less than a miracle
in managing to fi nd the delicate
balance between Tolstoy the writer and
Tolstoy the man. In many ways this could
be attributed to the cinematic approach
of the book, the skillful use of fl ashbacks
tracing his life back from the fateful
fl ight from home, to fi nd the answer to
the question: Who was that man who
died in Astapovo? – Alexander Gavrilov,
Snob
Th is new book about the man oft en referred
to as the genius of Russian literature
is a good match to the genius’ novels
themselves. Skillfully and thoroughly,
the author weaves the fabric of his investigative
novel – which makes you hold
your breath like a true thriller would – in
an attempt to explain the strange fact
that up until this day remains a mystery
– Tolstoy’s escape from home right
before his death. Th is is not a reference
book of facts and fi gures, but an exciting
novel with one of the most contradictory
thinkers of our times as the main character.
Having researched tons of sources –
letters, memoirs, diaries of Tolstoy and
his family, servants, followers and close
friends – Basinsky creates a seamless mosaic
so perfect you couldn’t fi nd a single
fault with a magnifying glass. – Vladimir
Pankratov, Afi sha
Pavel Basinsky
Leo Tolstoy: Escape from Paradise
Th is is a detailed chronicle of the life
of Tolstoy, researched and investigated
from every possible angle. It’s not just
a story of an eccentric death but a fullfl
edged biography told with a particular
incident of Tolstoy’s life – his fl ight from
home – as a starting point in a series of
detailed fl ashbacks. It gives an insight
into many aspects of Tolstoy’s life: His
relationship with the church, with people
in his household, dependents and
frequent guests, and his social network
in the last years of his life. Th e fi nancial
side of life. Th e history of his marriage…
Th e author has a good “Tolstoy sense”,
his interpretation of the source is deep
and credible. – Lev Danilkin, Afi sha

Alexander Genis
Alexander Genis is an established writer, literary critic, and a radio broadcaster. Born in
Ryazan, Russia, in 1953, he grew up in Riga, Latvia, and immigrated to the US in 1977.
Alexander Genis is a true cosmopolitan, full of passion about the world culture that
infl uences his texts. Milorad Pavic compares the texts Genis creates to a “pulsating
stream of explosions”. Alexander Genis worked as the host of weekly audio magazine
‘American Hour’ (Radio Liberty), as host of the TV Show “Letters from America” (TV
channel ‘Culture’), and as a columnist for several periodicals. His numerous books refl
ect the author’s bi– culturalism: Russian and American civilizations are compared in
their various manifestations. A shrewd and observant writer, Genis pioneered the
trend of cultural essayism, a specifi c genre combining lyrical narrative with methods
used in cultural studies. Alexander Genis is probably the best essayist at work in the
Russian language today. In his work Genis, has incorporated traits that are typical of
the Western European and American traditions – wordplay, wit, and precision. His essays
are dynamic, informative, and a consistently unfolding feast of joy for readers.
Alexander Genis’s essays have been translated into English, Japanese, German,
French, Italian, Serbian, Hungarian, Latvian and other languages, and included in various
anthologies and university studies. � ere are as yet only a few full – length books
in translation, however.
“It is a common knowledge,” Genis says, “that literature tends to repeat itself. What is
unique, however, is the soul that is located between the body and the text”.
Bibliography Alexander Genis:
2011 – Landscapes – New Literary Review
2011 – Dovlatov and Environs
2001 – � e portrait of the literary lion in the broad context of
Russian America – Corpus/AST, ; Vagrius
2010 – Candy Wrappers – Coprus/AST
2010 – Kolobok and Others. Culinary Adventures – Corpus/
AST, 2008
2009 – A Particular Case – Astrel
2009 – Six Fingers – CoLibri/Atticus
2008 – Zen of Football and Other Stories – Astrel/AST
2004 – Knit – Vagrius
2003 – Collected Works, Essays, 3 volumes – U – Factory
2002 – Sweet Life – Vagrius
2001 – A Ticket to China – Amphora
2000 – USA from A to Y
1996 – � e Tower of Babel – Alexandra
“Genis is like King Midas: everything he
touches turns into fi ne literature.” – Tatyana
Tolstaya, the author of Th e Slynx
“Genis is rightfully regarded as one of the
leading Russian literary critics, as well as
an expert on cultural issues, enjoying in
today's Russia the same kind of reputation
that Roland Barthes did in France in
the 1960's and 70's.” – Prof. Lev Loseff
“Genis is rightfully regarded as one of the
leading Russian literary critics, as well as
an expert on cultural issues, enjoying in
today’s Russia
the same kind of reputation that Roland
Barthes did in France in the 1960’s and
70’s.” – Prof. Lev Loseff
Essays:
Brodsky in New York. An essay about the poet in American
landscape
Russian Postmodernism. � e paradigm Shi� in Post – Soviet
Literature
Foreign translations:
2000 – Red Bread. A collection of essays. English, Glas New
Russian Writing
1999 – Russian Postmodernism: New Perspectives on Post-
Soviet Culture – Mikhail Epshtein, Alexandr Genis. English,
Berghahn Book
2006 – � e 60ies. Latvia, Jumava
2006 – Dovlatov and Environs. Serbia, Geopoetica. Estonia
200 – Landscapes. Serbia, Geopoetica
1996 – Russian Cuisine in Exile. Japan, Michitani. Serbia, Geopoetica.
France, Anatolia
1998 – Native Speech. Europa Konyvkiado, Hungary

In co-authorship with
Peter Vail
Essays: 1990; 2002; 2007
Colibri, 320 pp
Rights sold:
Japan, Michitani, 1996
Serbia, Geopoetica
France, Anatolia
Complete German
translation available
2004, Vagrius
288 pp;
Corpus, 2011
Russian Cuisine in Exile
Alexander Genis
In an unlikely scenario of John Lindqvist writing a script for Ghostbusters and setting
it in the Soviet Russia the result would have been this, CSE/2 – a suspense
paranormal thriller in the time of the Soviet Stillness.
A consistent bestseller in Russia since its fi rst
publication in 1990, and probably the most famous
collaborative work of Vail and Genis, this
collection of articles and essays is more than a
book of recipes. Russian Cuisine in Exile, a recording
of a vast cultural and historical epoch, a
book about Russia and Russians, has itself become
a distinguished literary event.
Despite the fact that an original colorful recipe
crowns each entry in the book, this collection of
essays is not a culinary study. Each article off ers
a smart, witty, encyclopedic insight into the cultural
and social life of Russians immigrants in
USA, and of the formation of a class of modern
representatives of the intellectual elite and mid-
dle class in the new Russia. � e author’s clear vision,
surgically precise defi nitions, and remarkable
erudition, make the book a true reader’s
delight.
� is book exhibits all the signature characteristics
of the authors’ style: energy, an emotional
pressure and pitch that you don’t expect from a
book on cuisine, authorial wit, an almost dandifi
ed, polished style, outward simplicity, and “confessional”
frankness. At the same time, the authors
distance themselves from the reader, as if
demonstrating the grandness of the gesture:
two high-brow intellectuals taking on a book of a
“low genre”.
The ease, aphoristic quality, and stylistic play that are characteristic of Vail and Genis' writing
paradoxically serves to create and support the image of thinkers and writers who are not merely
scratching the surface of eternal themes in their narrative, but, rather, who grapple in mortal
combat with the insolubility of tormenting questions. – Vzglyad
Dovlatov and Th e Environs
� is is an original biography of Sergei Dovlatov,
Russian renown émigré writer in America. In
his research Genis explores complex intertwining
links between Dovlatov and two cultures –
the Russian and the American – they both
learned to incorporate. As a result there comes
an uncommon literary biography, a true literary
manifest, and a remarkable work of fi ction. Al-
A Cosmopolitan
� is author’s careful and subjective selection of
essays and articles of the past fi ve years makes
a brilliant travelogue – informative, inspiring,
and ultimately joyful. Alexander Genis lavishly
shares with readers of his travel experience
spanning continents, cultures and national character
in what becomes an at once exotic and
universal landscape of the world, seen by a true
cosmopolitan. Lyrical prose, philosophical
exander Genis uses the portrait of one of Russia’s
greatest literary voices of the second of
half of the 20th century as a means to defi ne
the epoch of the late Soviet time, to explore
the generation of 1960s, a unique phenomenon
of an intellectual and cultural emigration as
well as to introduce readers to an utterly engaging
world of the author’s self.
notes, and even funny anecdotes – these essays
serve to the unifying goal: transforming an everyday
fact into an exotic phenomenon and a
lightweight emotion into a cultural experience.
From New York to Moscow, from Italy to Catalonia,
from China to Germany and the Baltics –
this is a gripping journey of a fi dget fi lled with
wonder at the world.

Petr Vail
Petr Vail (1949-2009) was a distinguished journalist, writer, and broadcaster. He was
born in 1949 in Riga, the capital of what is now Latvia. He graduated from the Moscow
Publishing Institute. In 1977, Vail immigrated to the United States, where he contributed
to a number of Russian-language publications. For over a decade, he worked
closely with prominent writer Sergei Dovlatov (exiled from the USSR), who became his
close friend. In the mid-1980s, Vail began working for Radio Liberty’s New York offi ce.
He spent nearly twenty years in New York before joining new RFE/RL’s headquarters
in Prague, Czech Republic, where he served as managing editor for Radio Liberty until
his death in 2009.
Petr Vail is the author of numerous essays, and a number of books in co-authorship
with his friend Alexander Genis (including the bestselling title Russian Cuisine in Exile).
His most famous work, Genius Loci (1999; new edition 2010), was also made into a
TV fi lm containing 23 episodes, which was broadcast in Russia in 2008 to great acclaim.
Vail on himself: I know the following about myself: I am a Russian man of letters, an
American citizen, and a resident of Czech Republic who wants to live in Italy – from the
interview for booknik.ru
Vail on the essay: [An essay] is a fl ow of free associations disciplined by the personality
of the author. Personal freedom has not been a category in the paradigm of Russia;
this has resulted in the absence of the essay as a genre in Russian literary culture.
Bibliography Petr Vail
Genius Loci – New Literary Review, 1999; Corpus/AST, 2010
A Map of the Homeland – 2003, CoLibri, 2007, Corpus/
AST – 2011
Poems about Me – CoLibri/Atticus, 2006, Corpus/AST –2011
A Word in Journey – Corpus/AST, 2010
Essays: 1999, Nezavisimaya
Gazeta
2010, 448 pp, Corpus/AST
Genius Loci
In Genius Loci, real and virtual journeys become
essential graphic evidence of the prominence of
geography, the topos, in the formation of the
character of culture, nation and people.
It is a rather trite assumption that an artist is
closely linked to his place. Nevertheless, Vail brilliantly
succeeds in revealing the nuances of such
a connection: be it Joyce’s adoration-hatred of
Dublin, or Flaubert’s for Rouen; Petersburg, unthinkable
without Dostoevsky; Moscow as the
city of late Bulgakov; Barcelona perceived as
the city of Gaudi; El Greco’s transformation into
a Toledo artist; or the stylistic balance between
Mahler and Vienna.
“Petr Vail is a man who turned literature
into a means of survival. He expresses the
existential vision of a writer who does not
simply discover the world for his readers,
but also helps them to live with the
diffi culties of modern reality. Th is why
all his work – his travelogues on his Russian
journeys; Genius Loci, in which Vail
describes the cities and their beloved authors;
and his books about 1960s, which
he wrote in co-authorship with Genis as
an in-depth examination of our life and
our values – all of this is perceptive, clear,
and accessible. In its accessibility, Vail’s
writing reaches the heights of true talent”
– Victor Erofeev, internationally acclaimed
author of Russian Beauty and Th e
Good Stalin
Foreign translations
Russian Cuisine in Exile – Japan, Michitani, 1996; Serbia,
Geopoetica; France, Anatolia
Native Speech – Europa Konyvkiado, 1998, Hungarian; Italy
Vail’s essays on Joyce, Borges, Wagner, Brodsky
and Fellini; Dublin, Athens, Tokyo, New York,
St Petersburg and Istanbul – depict a defi nitive,
broad landscape of our place in culture and in
the world, serving as a defi nition of the modern
reader’s cultural self.
Vail, in his Genius Loci, portrays the city as a
background, a setting, and a protagonist of literary
works and artworks of prominent artists –
and he does so with elegance, facility, and brilliance,
which make the book at once a
page-turner, an intellectual feast, and an enlightening
journey.
The ease, aphoristic quality, and stylistic play that are characteristic of Vail and Genis' writing
paradoxically serves to create and support the image of thinkers and writers who are not merely
scratching the surface of eternal themes in their narrative, but, rather, who grapple in mortal
combat with the insolubility of tormenting questions. – Vzglyad

“THE HISTORY OF THE 20TH CENTURY AS SEEN THROUGH
THE EYES OF ONE PERSON” – RUSSIA TV CHANNEL
Lilianna Lungina
Lilianna Lungina, a renowned translator, was the fi rst to introduce the Russian reader to such
authors as Knut Hamsun, August Strindberg, Henrik Ibsen, and, most famously, Astrid Lindgren.
She was a Russian Jew who spent her childhood in Germany, France and Palestine, before moving
to the U.S.S.R. in 1933 at the age of 13.
Lungina experienced some of the most dramatic events of the 20th century, from Stalin’s purges
and World War II, to the Khrushchev thaw. It is no exaggeration to say that her life was a profound
expression of the century itself.
� e life of Lilianna Lungina
as told by herself in Oleg
Dorman’s documentary
Corpus/Astrel, Moscow
2010, 383 pp
Memoir
Awards:
� e Book of the Year 2009
Non-fi ction Category
Foreign rights
Sweden Ersatz
Poland WAB
Latvia Janis Roze
“It is hard to imagine anything more interesting
than listening to a wise person
tell you candidly about his or her life - especially
if this life was lived in Russia, and
lived in the way Lilianna Lungina lived
hers. Th is memoir has left the strongest
impression on me of any book in the past
several years”. Boris Akunin, the author of
the internationally bestselling Erast Fandorin
novels
“Th e fantastic life of Lilianna Lungina,
which manages to encompass the whole
20th century, and her amazing story about
this life, testify to the fact that the only
92,000 copies sold to date, the book is currently in the 13th printing
Transcript
� is deep, profound and insightful memoir took Russian readers by a storm - soaring
to the top of the national bestseller lists and receiving a unanimously warm
welcome from the cultural elite and ordinary readers alike. � is unprecedented
publishing success inspired numerous references to the memoir as “the most signifi
cant cultural event of the year”.
Lilianna Lungina, a renowned translator, was
the fi rst to introduce the Russian reader to
such authors as Knut Hamsun, August Strindberg,
Henrik Ibsen, and, most famously, Astrid
Lindgren. She was a Russian Jew who spent
her childhood in Germany, France and Palestine,
before moving to the U.S.S.R. in 1933 at
the age of 13. Lungina experienced some of
the most dramatic events of the 20th century,
from Stalin’s purges and World War II, to the
Khrushchev thaw. It is no exaggeration to say
that her life was a profound expression of the
century itself.
She agreed to tell the story of her life in Transcript,
an eight-hour documentary by Oleg Dorman.
Filmed in 1998 right before Lungina’s
death, it was initially turned down by all the major
networks. When it was fi nally shown on national
TV in 2009, the response from viewers
was so overwhelming that the book was published
shortly therea� er.
thing that will remain from the horrifying
20th century in Russia is - its culture”. Leonid
Parfenov, popular TV commentator
and author of several documentary series
“Th e narration is constructed in such a
way that the reader is immediately engaged,
and, full of compassion and love
from the outset, stops feeling the boundaries
between himself and the narrator”.
Chastny Correspondent
“Th is book is by no means a mine of information
that was unavailable until now. Its
uncommonness lies in something diff erent:
in the narrator’s ability to live in hell
Lilianna Lungina’s depth and charm as a person
inspire the reader to follow her life – every moment
of which was full of meaning – with bated
breath. She had the rare ability to show the
events of her personal life through the prism of
what was happening in the country. � e memoir
is full of sad and tender stories about her
family, her friends (who were mostly, of course,
members of the intellectual elite: scientists,
writers, fi lmmakers), and the country itself.
� ese are stories about a time in which not
only parents and children were killed, but also
the human soul itself.
But what captivated viewers of the documentary
and readers of the book alike was no doubt
the author’s charming, gentle self-irony, her
honesty and straightforwardness, and the intonations
of her own inimitable voice. Despite all
her hardships, Lungina’s message to the
younger generation in TRANSCRIPT is that
“events in my life that at fi rst seemed an unprecedented
disaster, in the long run o� en led
to remarkable happiness”.
and not to be contaminated by its gloom”.
Vedomosti
“Th e most signifi cant cultural event of the
year”. Ogonyok
“Aft er watching the documentary and
reading the book, you feel absolutely astonished”.
Infox
“Transcript is a revolutionary project. It
is about the essential and the human”. Izvestia
“Most of all, the series entrances viewers
with the magnetic quality of a woman
speaking about her whole life - a diffi cult,
brave and moral life”. Th e Moscow Ti mes

MAGIC STORYTELLER
Sveta Dorosheva
Sveta Dorosheva is no less than a magician. A 34-year old author and illustrator, linguist
and designer, copyrighter and art director, she manages to create stories where
words and images so magically intertwine they create a whole new universe, stories
so unique they turn the world on its head and Sveta lives in Israel with her husband and
two children.
Svetlana’s illustrator portfolio can be found here: www.behance.net/lattona
Selected Bibliography:
2011 � e Nenuphar Book
2009 Mummy Hurries Home
Exmo, Russia
2013
21 x 24 cm, full color
210 pp
Th e Nenuphar Book
� e Nenuphar Book is a book about people written
by fairies, gnomes, elves and other fairy-tale
creatures. It was found in a water lily under mysterious
circumstances (hence the name). � e
whole book is a collection of evidence by fairy
creatures proving that people exist.
It’s a book about people and human world, as
seen through the eyes of fairy-tale creatures.
� ey don’t generally believe in people, but
some have travelled to our world in various
mysterious ways. Such travelers collected evidence
and observations about people in this
book. It’s an assortment of drawings, letters,
stories, diaries and other stuff about people,
written and drawn by fairies, elves, gnomes
and other fairy personalities. � ese observations
may be perplexing, funny and sometimes
absurd, but they all present a surprised look at
the things that we, people, take for granted.
Each chapter is written by a diff erent creature
– elf, fairy, gnome, ogre, giant, witch, etc. It
comprises such topics as human anatomy,
types and origin of people, magic human things
and dwellings, language, beliefs, rituals, work,
music, dance, and many more. Some observations
are odd, some awfully inaccurate, some -
plain funny, but they all weave together into a
tongue-in-the-cheek playful picture of a world
so incredibly odd to an outsider, that it’s no
wonder fairy creatures can’t believe in it!
‘� is is a series of book illustrations that
presents an attempt of fairy-tale creatures
(who don’t believe in people) to understand
what is a man, based on testimonials of people
themselves (quotes by famous people on the
nature of man). � e resulting impression is
rather perplexing’.
With her imaginative illustrations, Sveta is
overlapping philosophy and literature, creating
her own fi ctional narrative in the form of fairy
tale, whilst actually defi ning many truths about
human nature.