The chief female character in the book, Olga, can hardly be called the heroine; she appears too briefly for that.

But she is admitted to be a fine portrait of the Russian woman as she was about to become, not as she then existed.

Gontcharoff's "An Every-day Story" is also celebrated; equally so is his "The Ravine," a very distressing picture of the unprincipled character of an anarchist.
As the author changed his mind about the hero in part while writing the book, it is not convincing.
Another of the men who made his mark at this time was Dmitry Vasilievitch Grigorovitch (born in 1812), who wrote a number of brilliant books between 1847-1855.

His chief merit is that he was the first to begin the difficult study of the common people; the first who talked in literature about the peasants, their needs, their virtues, their helplessness, their misfortunes, and their sufferings.

Of his early short stories, "Anton Goremyka" (wretched fellow) is the best.