This is an investigation of a dramatic event in human life, suicide. It was undertaken by a writer about writers who, according to medical data, form a group with a high risk of suicide. Chkhartishvili studies the history of suicide among writers from antiquity to the present from various religious and cultural perspectives. The second volume contains 370 biographical notes about writers who voluntarily left this life. The author is also writing fiction under the pseudonym B. Akunin, particularly the series about the detective Erast Fandorin. Bibliography.