Godless Lane

“The Godless Lane” by Marina Stepnova is a piercing novel by the winner of the “Big Book” about what makes us human.

Ivan Ogaryov never wanted to become a doctor. He simply didn’t have a choice. While Ivan studied, medicine seemed completely alien to him. Everything changed after a tragic incident in the army: Ogaryov realized that now he had to, was obliged to become a doctor. And not just a doctor, but a children’s doctor. And life, it seemed, was going on as usual: marriage, deaths, unjust service, and the thankless stupidity of those he had to fight for… And then Ivan meets her—a girl who lives in the Godless Lane. A girl who looks like an exciting book with dozens of pages torn out or smeared. A girl who will open for him blessed Italy. A girl who will become his chance for a new life… Who will he become in this new life?

Marina Stepnova is the author of the bright literary event novel “Women of Lazarus” (Big Book Prize, translated into many European languages), as well as the novels “The Surgeon” and “The Garden.” In her third novel “The Godless Lane,” with her characteristic sensitivity and depth, the writer returns again to the theme of children deprived of love, who, as adults, remain alone with their own demons.