A collection of fictional stories, set in Russia, have in common the lives of ordinary men and women during the century following the Russian revolution: a love letter without words eludes the secret police; a man returns from exile in Siberia and settles a debt; a little girl loses her great love Ð a Caucasian sheepdog; the murdered Tzar's daughter is disturbingly reborn; an old man who experienced the Revolution, communism and war, finds solace in pigeons; an oligarch's party ends in violence; a woman finds herself an artist's muse, after a chance encounter online; an impromptu arm-wrestling match disrupts a Siberian Christmas; a country boy finds courage in a spectacular act of folly, on the centenary of the Revolution in October 2017.