Sergey Lebedev's collection of short stories, ‘Titan,’ is about the fact that nothing and no one disappears without a trace. Why don't birds peck at ripe apples, but flies swarm to them as if they were meat? Why does a dog whimper as if a person is groaning? Why is the grandmother a behemoth, even though she eats lean and bland food? And why does she have iron teeth? In Lebedev's stories, all the hidden Soviet horrors, all the concealed murders and petty betrayals have left their mark on us – on places, on things, even on people. Evil never dissolves, never disappears on its own. If even one clumsy person scratches the surface a little, inadvertently breaks this seal, takes one step beyond the familiar, the doors to the past will open: the deported will return home as a multitude of ghosts, the graves will reject the criminals, and underground deities born of childhood fear and hunger will crawl out.