Defending Leningrad Women Behind Enemy Lines

This book includes a remarkable diary of an ordinary Soviet middle-class teenager named Ina Konstantinova, who was transformed by the outbreak of the war and death of her boyfriend. Unlike Anne Frank, the most famous teenage author of a WWII diary, Ina was to die fighting, after she ran away from home to become a partisan and avenge her boyfriend's death. At times Ina served alongside her father; his poignant "Story of a Daughter" complements her diary. Ina's parents were both teachers and members of Soviet intelligentsia. Her comrade-in-arms Masha Poryvayeva, caught and executed by the enemy, was of a working class background.

Dr. Kazimiera J. Cottam, an expert military translator and author, is a recipient of the prestigious 1999 Mary Zirin Prize of the Association for Women in Slavic Studies. A PhD graduate in Eastern European history from the University of Toronto, she also is a former part-time professor of Russian history at the University of Ottawa, Canada, and Research Associate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.