This book is essentially the diary kept by director Boris Yukhananov when he was a young man in the army. It was written under the pseudonym of Nikita Ilyin in the 1980s.

Nikita was brought up on the works of Leo Tolstoy and Thomas Mann. He dreams of making a movie, but instead is forced to endure daily drills on the parade ground, nit-picking officers, mind-numbing political studies, and physical and psychological abuse at the hands of older recruits. The story of his survival and personal loss also becomes one of self discovery.

Boris Yukhananov on his novel-diary:

“I want people to read the story of Nikita Ilyin because I feel his notes reveal a very unusual existence. This is the story of a righteous young man hidden within a story about the soul. It is a tale of discovery, and of the loss of sacred consciousness. I invite the reader to read these notes, not because they promise anything, but because I want them to conduct their own internal experiment by taking an active interest in someone else's life. They may unexpectedly find that there is much to relate to in Nikita's experience, and that Nikita’s story is in fact a reflection of themselves. There is something irresistibly magnetic in the fresh jottings of a suicide diary. What can we call it? The power of art? The power of life? The power of human nature, revealed in one complete action, stunning in its simplicity and madness?”

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