★ The author of this book is the famous photographic artist Leonid Nikolaevich Lazarev, who has worked for 60 years in the fields of photojournalism and artistic photography.
★ As a living witness of the era, time has allowed him to take up the pen and express in writing those things captured by light and shadow.
★ The stories span over half a century of Leonid Nikolaevich Lazarev's life – capturing both the emotions of his childhood and his modern worldview.

Short essays, chronicles, and stories are easier to read and perceive. These works contain humor and self-irony, sometimes tragedy and mysticism. Therefore, reading them cannot be considered mere entertainment. The writing style leaves mysterious gaps for the thoughtful reader to seek answers to questions posed intentionally or unintentionally by the author.
The stories span over half a century of Leonid Nikolaevich Lazarev's life – capturing both the emotions of his childhood and his modern worldview. The events described and the artist's observations are intricately linked to the historical background. You can see the author is a person of the 60s generation. War, repression, and the difficult post-war period did not break this young man: even in such hard times, he experienced moments of genuine happiness.

[Author] Leonid Nikolaevich Lazarev
Leonid Nikolaevich Lazarev – realist photographer, one of Moscow's earliest street photographers, newsreel cameraman, portraitist, and photojournalist. In his career spanning over half a century, he has touched upon almost all genres of photography. He graduated from the Journalists' Skills Institute attached to the Union of Journalists at the USSR State Institute of Cinematography. He collaborated with many Soviet newspapers and magazines. He photographed public and political events, diverse Moscow on weekdays and holidays, lyrical landscapes, workers, and still lifes. His subjects included politicians and A-list stars such as: Leonid Utyosov, Maya Plisetskaya, Samuel Marshak, and Yuri Gagarin. He traveled to many countries and spent eight years photographing the Maly Theatre in Moscow. He received numerous awards. In 1962, he was named one of the world's best photographers of the year by foreign press in a photography annual. In 1999, he was awarded the title "Kodak Master." His works are held in the Tretyakov Gallery and the Moscow Museum.