About the book: 2011 / Book by Eduard Kochergin - chief artist of the Bolshoi Drama Theater. G. A. Tovstonogov - based on memories of the difficult post-war times, when he fled from the Omsk orphanage for children of “enemies of the people” to his homeland in Leningrad, - about a run that lasted more than six years, with all the vicissitudes and wanderings in the “SS” with its then state-owned houses, NKVD orphanages and colonies. In 2010, the book received one of the most prestigious literary awards - “National Bestseller”. This (second) edition is supplemented by a previously unpublished story “The Ballad of a Wooden Plane”. The appendix contains geographical maps and texts songs and photographic documents of the 1940s-1950s.