The famous British journalist Owen Matthews is half Russian, and it was about his Russian roots that he wrote this book, which became a world bestseller and was translated into 22 languages. Matthews studied at Oxford and then worked as a reporter in hot spots - from Yugoslavia to Iraq. A significant part of his career is connected with Russia: he has written extensively about Chechnya, worked for The Moscow Times, and now heads the Moscow bureau of Newsweek magazine. Recounting the dramatic fate of three generations of his family, Matthews places special emphasis on the extraordinary love story of his parents. Their romance began in 1963, when Owen's father Mervyn, who came from Oxford to Moscow as a student exchange student, fell in love with the daughter of a communist executed in 1937, Lyudmila. The Soviet system and the all-powerful KGB separated the lovers for six whole years, but the selfless and tireless Mervin, at the cost of enormous efforts and sacrifices, achieved triumph - “anti-Soviet” love triumphed. * * *If this story were not a documentary, it would seem too fantastic.

Leonid Parfenov, journalist and TV presenter

The book is unexpected, strange, written transparently and simply. It has the breath of the century. There are little people who are being crushed by a huge country. Grinds and cannot grind.

Nikolai Svanidze, historian and TV presenter

Without a doubt, this is one of the most convincing and exciting books about Russia of the 20th century. Buy it, read it voraciously, and give it to your friends. It doesn't matter how familiar they are with the topic. In any case, they will be grateful.

The Moscow Times

This magnificent book is at once an exciting tale of love, a fascinating investigation and a real “spy” novel. Three generations of Russian people are emerging from the shadow of oblivion. Three generations in whose lives the history of the century was embodied.

Télérama

An outstanding book... Owen Matthews writes with extraordinary vivacity, but still this is the technique not of a journalist, but of a novelist - and a great one at that masters.

Spectator