A tour de force – exquisite and gripping, finely translated, fiction that pulls you into the beautiful and brutal service of imagining and understanding the human realities of modern Russia, a series of tales meticulously crafted and deeply imagined.

Philippe Sands, author of East West Street

One of Russia's most prominent contemporary writers, Lebedev, 41, has been hailed for a series of novels that hold a mirror up to Russia's blighted past. A former geologist, he chips away at the deep strata of his country's 20th-century history, the seams of trauma concealed by a state-sanctioned campaign of oblivion.

The Financial Times

A luminous and magical writer, Sergei Lebedev excavates the Soviet past and gives voice to its restless ghosts. By exploring Russia's dark history he sheds light on its terrible present. Lebedev's stories are urgent and compelling at a time when a Kremlin leader is waging a myth-inspired war in Ukraine.

Luke Harding, author of Invasion: The Inside Story of Russia's Bloody War and Ukraine's Fight for Survival

Memories of the Soviet era emerge through relics, landmarks, and fantastical occurrences in this satisfying collection . . . Lebedev adds vibrant lyrical descriptions to the strange interplay of past and present . . . There's a real payoff to these rich and ambiguous stories.

Publishers Weekly

We know from William Faulkner that 'the past is never dead, [and that] it is not even past'. Yet some pasts are more consequential than others, and Sergei Lebedev's prose captures vividly the crippling presence of Russia's Stalinist past in the life of contemporary Russian society. A very important read.

Jan Tomasz Gross

Lebedev's vibrant, steely fiction has always shown how the weight of Russia's past shapes its present, and this story collection also exhibits a fantastical edge ... the discerning will find much brilliance here

Library Journal