Natalia Plakhotniuk-Zadniprovska

11-year-old Minko is forced to move from a decaying village to the city with his father, mother and sick grandfather. New apartment, school and classmates greet the boy with hostility. This only strengthens his desire to return home, where there is a forest and his friends. But what Minko misses the most is Ginger Fairy, a tame moose he once saved and which disappeared the day he left.

Ukrainian composer Mykola Lysenko goes for a walk in Kyiv. Along the way, his memory takes him back in time: first to his childhood in the village of Hrynky; to May 1861, when he attended Taras Shevchenko's funeral; to a trip to Leipzig; to the time when he was working on the opera "Taras Bulba"; to the images of Olha O'Connor and Olha Lypska, who gave him love, happiness, and inspiration.

The Hitlerian army has merely encroached upon the territory of Ukraine, and the majority of the local people have been already ready to cave in to a new regime. The Ukrainian policemen have killed the boy. It is clear that there is no hope to expect the justice from the invaders, that’s why the killed boy’s mother declares the war on the hangsman.

Sashko and Yulia have been friends since childhood. Sashko grew up in a communal apartment surrounded by post-war poverty. Yulia fell seriously ill during the war. Sashko goes to study in the big city, where he gains his first experiences of independent living in a student dormitory and on a construction site. Later, he meets Yulia again.