About the book: 2014 / The unique TV project "Russian Trace" has been airing on the TV channel "My Planet" for several years now. Over several years of dangerous and exciting adventures, Captain Alexey Nikulin and his first mate Mark Podrabinek visited different parts of the planet. In the fascinating form of a historical adventure detective story, they told the details of Russian expeditions of the 18th–19th centuries. However, as often happens, a lot remained “behind the scenes” of the documentary series of the project. In the book “Islands of Bad Luck,” Alexey Nikulin talks about his expedition under the sails of a yacht White Russian to the Greek islands, which were part of the Russian Archipelago province in the 18th century. This episode of Russian history is little known. A state formation, surprising in its revolutionary essence, far beyond the borders of the Russian Empire, existed for only four years and was liquidated in exchange for preferences received by our country in Crimea. Material evidence of the existence of a well-governed province, the role of Count Orlov in its formation, strange and inexplicable events of the Russian-Turkish war and the conquest of the Greek islands - all this became the topic of research by the author of the book.