This novel of love, adventure, and male rivalry on the frontiers of nineteenth-century Russia - completed in 1862, when Tolstoy was in his early thirties - has always surprised readers who know Tolstoy best through the vast, panoramic fictions of his middle years. Unlike those works, The Cossacks is lean and supple, economical in design and execution. | The Cossacks by Leo Tolstoy, Hardcover | Indigo Chapters