The best Soviet SF writers - THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SCIENCE FICTION Folktale motifs are masterfully updated to embody in a dark picaresque the black and white Magic of modern alienated science and society - Encyclopedia of Science Fiction

When young programmer Alexander Ivanovich Privalov picks up two hitchhikers while driving in Karelia, he is drawn into the mysterious world of the National Institute for the Technology of Witchcraft and Thaumaturgy, where research into magic is serious business.

And where science, sorcery and socialism meet, can chaos be far behind?