A man wakes up in a hospital bed, with no idea who he is or how he came to be there. The only information the doctor shares with him is his name: Innokenty Petrovich Platonov.As memories slowly resurface, Innokenty begins to build a vivid picture of his former life as a young man in Russia in the early twentieth century, living through the turbulence of the Russian Revolution and its aftermath. Soon, only one question remains: how can he remember the start of the twentieth century, when the pills by his bedside were made in 1999?Reminiscent of the great works of twentieth-century Russian literature, with nods to Dostoevsky s Crime and Punishment and Bulgakov s The White Guard, The Aviator cements Vodolazkin s position as the rising star of Russia s literary scene.