The Troubles, once occurring, became the matrix of Russian history. Each time an “interregnum” occurred, be it 1917 or 1991, the resolution of the question of a new government was accompanied by the same spontaneous involvement of a huge number of people in history, the destruction of the usual picture of the world, political division and the bitterness of society. It is for this reason that the Time of Troubles attracts the unflagging attention of historians, writers, publicists, and simply people reflecting on the fate of the Fatherland. Having chosen for my story three years, which marked the peak of the political upheavals of the first Russian Troubles - from 1610 to 1612/ 13,” the author of the book turned to the biographies of the main characters of this historical period. Each of the biographies is so unusual that just an impartial presentation of everything that happened to the hero can rival the most exciting adventure novel in terms of the entertaining nature of the plot. Here are the governors of the First Militia Prokofy Petrovich Lyapunov, Ivan Martynovich Zarutsky and Prince Dmitry Timofeevich Trubetskoy, and the organizers of the next Nizhny Novgorod militia Kuzma Minin and Prince Dmitry Mikhailovich Pozharsky, and now half-forgotten historical characters, without whom, however, it is impossible to imagine that time - in particular, the Kazan clerk Nikanor Shulgin, who became the sole ruler and arbiter of the fate of the huge “Kazan Kingdom”.