Shishkin is the most prominent Russian novelist of his generation. To compare him to Solzhenitsyn is no exaggeration... [ An] important book * Sunday Times * An elegant blend of history, biography and polemic * Daily Telegraph * Often sings with powerfully estranged, original observations... minutiae and grand philosophy collide on every page. * Boris Fishman, The New York Times Book Review (on The Light and The Dark) * Shishkin is interested in what is most precious and singular in classic Russian fiction: the passionate inquiry into what, in Maidenhair, is called the 'soul, quintessence, pollen.' * Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal (on The Light and The Dark) *