Debut novel by Andrei Astvatsaturov (professional philologist, connoisseur Henry Miller, grandson of the famous Soviet literary critic V.M. Zhirmunsky) recalls with his intonation the best pages of Sergei Dovlatov, Woody Allen and Pavel Sanaev. The hero-storyteller - the St. Petersburg "intellectual with glasses" - takes the reader to the places of his late Soviet childhood and university youth, everywhere maintaining sharp observation, self-irony and a brilliant sense of humor.