Miron Fedorov

Antonina Milyukova is a beautiful and bright young woman, born in the aristocracy of 19th century Russia. She could have anything she'd want, and yet her only obsession is to marry Pyotr Tchaikovsky, with whom she falls in love from the very moment she hears his music. The composer finally accepts this union, but after blaming her for his misfortunes and breakdowns, his attempts to get rid of his wife are brutal. Consumed by her feelings for him, Antonina decides to endure and do whatever it takes to stay with him. Humiliated, disgraced and discarded, she is slowly driven to madness.

In modern-day Moscow, disaffected former journalism student Roman follows a cryptic invitation to join “the elite” and finds himself forcibly transformed into a vampire. But not your typical creature of the night. Thanks to a parasitical worm known as the Tongue, Roman (now called Rama) has become part of a ruling class of vampires who exercise an “anonymous dictatorship” over humans based not on a thirst for blood but the hunger for money. As various instructors school him in the ways of their elite breed, and Rama explores his new supernatural abilities, he begins a tentative relationship with another newly turned vampire, Hera. His desire for more knowledge about this intoxicating new world also leads him into potentially deadly conflict with Mithra, his mentor who becomes his nemesis.