City of Gradov and Other Stories

The Soviet manager Ivan Fyodorovich Shmakov goes to the provincial city of Gradov, five hundred versts from Moscow, to "immerse himself in provincial affairs and refresh them with common sense," but the local bureaucratic apparatus, mired in meaningless bureaucracy, is unwilling to change anything.
This edition also includes other works by the author, such as the unfinished novel "Happy Moscow," the well-known stories "For the Future" and "Epiphany Gates," as well as masterpieces of military prose — the tales "Return," "Spirited People," and "Inanimate Enemy."