Dina Rubina is one of the best-known names among modern Russian writers. Starting with her first novels, which appeared in the 1980s in tolstye (thick) literary magazines, she attracted attention from serious Moscow critics. Some characterized Rubina as one of the representatives of "women's prose," while others saw in her a successor to Iurii Valentinovich Trifonov and his style of social psychological writing. All admitted the brilliance and strength of her talent. Today, Rubina is rightfully one of the most popular authors of the Russian diaspora.

Dina Il'inichna Rubina was born on 19 September 1953 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Her father, Il'ia Davidovich Rubin, was an artist, and her mother, Rita Aleksandrovna Rubina, was a history teacher. Both her parents were Ukrainian Jews whose families had arrived in Tashkent in their own ways: Rubina's mother came with waves of refugees from Poltava, in central Ukraine, while her father returned from service...