In May 1941 Lena Mukhina was an ordinary teenage girl, living in Leningrad, worrying about her homework and the boy she liked, and keeping a diary of her hopes and dreams. On June 22, 1941, Hitler declared war on the Soviet Union. Leningrad was besieged. Lena and her family fought to stay alive; their city was starving, its citizens dying in the hundreds of thousands. Lena records the desperate hunt for food, the bitter cold of the Russian winter and the cruel deaths of those she loved. A truly remarkable account, this is the vivid first-hand testimony of a courageous young woman.