When the president of Russia suddenly dies, a man whose politics are virtually unknown succeeds him. The change in political leaders sparks paranoia among American CIA officials, so CIA director Bill Cabot recruits a young analyst to supply insight and advice on the situation. Then the unthinkable happens: a nuclear bomb explodes in a U.S. city, and America is quick to blame the Russians.
When in 1941 Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union, their troops quickly besieged Leningrad. Foreign journalists are evacuated but one of them, Kate Davies, is presumed dead and misses the plane. Alone in the city she is helped by Nina Tsvetnova a young and idealist police officer and together they will fight for their own survival and the survival of the people in the besieged Leningrad.
In the same world two sisters live. One of which was largely unlucky at the very beginning of life: Ulyana is a "gable child" who, by the age of thirty, had preserved the outlook, behavior and reactions of a ten-year-old girl. The second - Lisa - was not even luckier. She is a healthy person whose life is completely dependent on a disabled sister who voluntarily or involuntarily destroys the plans of her ambitious sister actress.
