The touching story of a hired hand who could not admit to her motherhood until the end of her life, the frank confession of a former convict Kyrylo, the eerie rural tales and the dramatic fate of Princess Katrusia - Shevchenko\'s first three novels reveal to us the world of a person of the first half of the nineteenth century, his experiences, struggles, dreams and disappointments. Brilliant translations into Ukrainian by renowned masters of the word Borys Antonenko-Davydovych and Viktor Sapitsky seem to bring Shevchenko closer to our time: his heroes and heroines live, love, suffer, and fight, just like we do today.