Nina Mikhailovna Subbotina (1877–1961) can rightfully be called the Stephen Hawking of Russian science. One of the first Russian women astronomers, she received a professional education, but could not work in a scientific institution due to a serious illness suffered in childhood. Having created her own observatory, Subbotina successfully engaged in observational astronomy and the study of solar-terrestrial connections. Her observational data were regularly published in the most prestigious international astronomical journals. But her range of interests was much wider. She became the first woman in Russia to write a book on the history of astronomy (“The History of Halley’s Comet”), which was awarded the prize of the Russian Astronomical Society. Among her contemporaries, Subbotina was a legend. Deaf and speechless, she maintained contact with her colleagues through extensive correspondence. Her letters preserved evidence of the living attitude of her contemporaries to a whole range of current astronomical topics of the 20th century - from Lemaître’s cosmological ideas to the launch of the first artificial satellites. Doctor of Historical Sciences, chief researcher at the Institute of the History of Natural Sciences and Technology. S.I. Vavilova RAS Olga Valkova scrupulously collected the epistolary heritage of N.M. Subbotina, supplementing it with archival sources, a significant part of which is being published for the first time. Based on Subbotina's non-trivial judgments and intonations, the book offers an alternative reading of the history of astronomy of the 20th century. On the cover: © Photo by Mathew Schwartz on Unsplash