Salnikov writes like nobody else these days: freshly, as if the world had been created yesterday. Th ere’s his striking and unique language, a grounded and tangible material world that, remarkably, doesn’t rule out fl ights of fancy, and a genuinely magical, glimmering ambiguity. - Medusa.io

So what is this novel about anyway? It’s about a strange twisted reality, as critics two centuries ago put it, a reality that stifl es and presses, that’s inescapable and lets nothing go…. And it’s also about the monster hiding inside a person. - Colta.ru

Salnikov uses illness the same way other writers use alcohol, drugs, and insanity. Kommersant.ru

There are characters here who are terribly charming, particularly Petrov himself, about whom very little is said other than his age (28), profession (auto mechanic), and illness (flu). But you see him clearly and there are lots of people like him these days: smart, understanding everything, not doing a whole lot (what can you do nowadays other than survive?), completely useless, drinking a lot, and horribly sweet. Salnikov’s novel is humorous but not fun, monotonous but interesting, exasperated but touching. And as the reader starts feeling terribly annoyed with that character, one always remembers: Russia is standing on people like him. Or, if we’re to be completely accurate, Russia is lying on them. - Dmitry Bykov, the nationally prize -winning author of The Evacuator and Pasternak

The degree of clarity with which this world is drawn cannot help but captivate – even the early Grishkovets would envy the density of familiar details on the pages of this text. But Salnikov is also witty and merciless to boot. - Gorky.media

It’s possible that the goal of this novel amounts to the reader acknowledging the skeletons in their own closest, even if they do so timidly and uncertainly, not wanting to fully admit those skeletons exist even for rebina healthy, successful person. - The Teacher’s Newspaper

Salnikov has taken on a topic that’s rather complex: an ordinary man suffering from his own ordinariness, mediocrity, typicality, and, yes, also from the flu. - Prochtenie

★This society is sick, everyone has a mental flu! A burning family, an enthusiastic world, is waiting for a magical pill.
★Rights sold to China, German, France, Italy, Denmark, Serbia, Latvia,Czech, Arab, Estonia, India, Romania, Bulgaria!
★Winner of the National Bestseller Prize (one of Russia's most prestigious literary awards, and was awarded to the best works with high artistic quality and best -selling book potential, only to one work each year)!
★Finalist for the Big Book Award, shortlisted for the New Literature Award List!
★As Russian phenomenon novel and a sensational work in Russian literature , critics said that this novel was annual literature discovery, won the favor of all Russian readers.
★Petrov’s Flu, a feature film directed by Kirill Serebrennikov, in Cannes Official Competition 2021! Adapted drama also released in the theater!

In Yekaterinburg, a terrible influenza raged. The 28 -year -old Peter Rove was seriously ill. He worked in a car repair plant and painted some comics that were not optimistic in his spare time. After infection, he often lost consciousness under the action of drugs, trapped in delirium and crazy. The novel "Petrov Flu" tells the loss and disillusionment of countless "Petrov" in Russia after the Cold War.

In July 2021, the film adapted from this novel was released at the Cannes Film Festival. At that time, the new crown epidemic also spread around the world, and the film compared with reality, which constitutes the metaphor of the current status of survival. In that condition, the marginalized people wandered in the restless reality, which was difficult to adapt and could not break for free, find the direction in the floating.

It is a story about an ordinary family, whose routine gets spoiled by a bad viral flu, is set against a snowy phantasmagoria at New Year’s Eve, the chthonic world open a gate to them: children dancing in rounds holding the Snow Maiden’s ice-cold hand, a serial female killer hunting for a new prey. A family drama transforms into a weirdly and eerie hallucinatory dream – or a nightmare. This book is also about monsters hidden in the human body. Alexei Salnikov uses illness to express the theme, just like other writers to express the theme with alcohol, drugs, and mental illnesses. Evil awakening may be in an instant, or by an inadvertent detail…

Alexei Salnikov

　　Alexei Salnikov (1978) was born in Tartu, Estonia. Since early childhood he has been living in the Ural region. Salnikov moved to Yekaterinburg in 2005. He has worked as a boiler-room operator, a garage mechanic, a guard, a plumber and a freelance journalist and translator from the English language. Eugene Turenko – the founder of the poetic school in Tagil championed Alexei Salnikov as a poet. Salnikov is a published author of several collections of poetry.
　　His debut novel, the Department, was published in the literary magazine «Volga», which also chose for publication his next novel, the Petrovs. In And Around the Flu. Volga nominated the Petrovs for the Big Book Award, the novel entered the shortlist and became the fi nalist of the season, critics unanimously called the novel a literary discovery of the year, and it played a chord with a vast readership all over Russia.