The foundation of the new military-adventure novel by the well-known writer Bohdan Sushchynsky is based on historical events connected with the fate of the 412th shore-based battery of the Odessa Naval Base (in the novel, its number and the names of artillerymen are changed). The battery was intended to defend the port and the city itself from attacks by enemy warships.
Built in the 1930s in the steppe east of Odessa according to the design of the famous military engineer Dmytro Karbyshev, this artillery complex—its main life-support points located deep underground—was carefully camouflaged. Naturally, until the fall of Odessa it remained a strictly secret site and attracted intense interest from the German and Romanian intelligence services.
The novel is an indirect continuation of the previously published novel “Black Commissars.”