Ilsur Metshin met with writer Guzel Yakhina

Today, the Mayor of Kazan Ilsur Metshin met with the famous writer Guzel Yakhina. The meeting was held at the Executive Committee on the eve of the presentation of her new novel “A Convoy to Samarkand”.

Ilsur Metshin discussed with Guzel Yakhina the book, on which she has been working for two and a half years, as well as the upcoming projects of the writer. At the end of the conversation, she presented a copy of the book to the head of the city.

Guzel Yakhina will present the book “A Convoy to Samarkand” to Kazan residents during recitals at the Aksyonov House and the National Library of the republic of Tatarstan.

For reference, the new novel by Guzel Yakhina, the author of the bestsellers “Zuleikha opens her eyes” and “My Children”, was published in early March. The book “A Convoy to Samarkand” takes place in 1923, during the famine in the Volga region, in one of the Dzerzhinsky trains, on which 500 street children are evacuated to a more prosperous region to save them from death. The writer calls the genre of the book as “red eastern” and notes that it includes several little-known facts about Kazan.

Earlier, at a press conference, Guzel Yakhina admitted that the story told in the novel is rather personal, since in 1922 her grandfather was sent to Turkestan on such convoy. He survived, but half of the children who travelled with him died.

Guzel Yakhina is a winner of the Big Book, Yasnaya Polyana and Star Ticket awards. In 2019, the TV series based on the book “Zuleikha Opens Her Eyes” was filmed in Kazan, and in 2020, it premiered on federal television.