In this city—where the sun appears rarely and the sky is veiled in mist—different eras, people, and destinies have intertwined. Here a madman speaks enduring truths, while those who reject “democratic values” dream of freedom and are ready to achieve it by any means, even at the cost of their lives. The gripping novel “Morok” by popular Siberian author Mikhail Shchukin, a laureate of the V.G. Rasputin National Literary Prize, powerfully and emotionally tells how deceptive promises lead to failure. The novel “A Name for a Son” and the novella “Oboroni i sokhrani” are devoted to the Siberian hinterland and the recent Soviet past, revealing all the complexities and contradictions of that period.