The new novel by Andrei Volos centers on the fates of two unusual people: German Bronnikov is a talented writer, but it’s the mid-1980s and the hero loses everything for freethinking. Work, membership in the Writers' Union, loses friends - or those whom he considered such. However, Bronnikov still has his “secret” joy: after getting a job as a concierge, he writes a novel about the last true Soviet Templar - the outstanding scientist Igor Shegaev. Having been through a psychiatric hospital and repressed under the article, Shegaev is serving his sentence in a camp in northern Russia. The Kafkaesque atmosphere of the novel is enhanced by the fact that Shegaev is a land surveyor by profession. Like the same Land Surveyor K. from Franz Kafka’s “The Castle.” The destinies of Bronnikov and Shegaev are intertwined, times, like in a mirror, look into each other, and it seems that “The Traitor” is written about our modernity. “The Traitor” is not a “fashionable” novel ", written not for the fun of the day, but for deep reflection. Volos's new novel incorporates the experience of Varlam Shalamov and Daniil Andreev and will be of interest to a wide range of readers.