Yuri Koval’s father served in the criminal investigation department of the Moscow region, during the war years and after it… That was how Gleb Zheglov was—only, of course, completely different. Some stories he would sometimes tell at home—of course, in a way that made the children laugh and find it interesting…
This is what the wonderful illustrator-artist Chizikov writes in his preface to the book—an artist who was friends with Koval.
So in form, it’s a children’s detective story. But it’s also a Gogol-like fantastical tale: a cheerful kind of surrealism, a vivid depiction of postwar life in the Moscow region, done brightly and with taste—and what a great book!