The Bronze Horseman is set during World War II, in what was then the Soviet Union (USSR). It spans the years from 1941 to 1943. Primarily set in Leningrad—the former capital of the USSR and historical political center under Peter the Great—the novel traces Germany’s impact on the city throughout WWII.

In 1941, German Nazi troops invaded the Soviet Union as a part of Adolf Hitler’s Operation Barbarossa. This military operation was meant to attack Ally powers, to eradicate communism, and to repopulate the USSR in particular with Germans. On June 22, 1941, the Siege of Leningrad began. Nazi troops created a blockade surrounding the city. Instead of trying to capture Leningrad, Hitler attempted to destroy the city via air raids and systematic starvation. The siege has since been classified as a genocide, due to the unprecedented impact on a civilian population and the marked death toll:

Immediately pre-war, the city had a population of just over three million. In the twelve weeks to mid-September 1941, when the German and Finnish armies cut it off from the rest of the Soviet Union, about half a million Leningraders were drafted or evacuated, leaving just over 2.5 million civilians, at least 400,000 of them children, trapped within the city. Hunger set in almost immediately, and in October police began to report the appearance of emaciated corpses on the streets” (Reid, Anna. “Siege of Leningrad: Deadliest City Blockade in Human History.” The History Reader).

Paullina Simons directly incorporates these historical events into her narrative. Book 1, Part 1, “The Lucent Dusk,” traces the initial occupation, while Book 1, Part 2, “Winter’s Fierce Embrace,” details the devastating famines which killed over one million Leningrad residents during the winter of 1941. The deaths Tatiana witnesses throughout the novel echo the deaths that defined this era in Russian history.