Victoria Lederman’s "The Mayan Calendar," Summary Automatic translate

This fantasy novella was written in 2014. It’s a story about responsibility for one’s actions and the strong friendship that develops in extreme circumstances. Three teenagers, due to one of their reckless actions, find themselves in an anomalous time loop, where each new day takes them back to yesterday. "The May Calendar" won a special prize at the Vladislav Krapivin International Children’s Literary Prize. In 2022, a Russian feature-length film of the same name was made based on the book.

Excursion to the archaeological site

On May 23rd, the students of sixth-grade "A" and their homeroom teacher, Klara Borisovna, set off on a bus excursion. The purpose of the trip was to explore the archaeological excavations of an ancient settlement. During a stop at an ancient monument, sixth-grader Gleb Elizarov, wanting to demonstrate his independence and courage, secretly scratched the date May 23, 2013, on a stone wall. Two classmates, the quiet, straight-A student Yura Karasev and the hyper-responsible Lena Zyuzina, unwittingly observed his actions. The next morning, the teenagers wake up to discover a strange time anomaly. The calendar reads May 22nd. Everyone around them behaves as if the excavation trip had never happened, repeating the conversations from the previous day.

Awareness of the temporal paradox

At first, the boys chalk it up to a prank, a technical glitch, or their own inattention. Gleb arrives at school and is forced to take a history test, which he had already successfully passed the day before. Soon, they realize the truth: time has gone backwards for them. Every day, they relive the events of yesterday, gradually slipping back into the past. Gleb, Yura, and Lena are the only people who fully retain their memory of the future. The rest of the townspeople live their normal lives, oblivious to the repetitions. The teenagers join forces and discover the true cause of the anomaly. It all stems from Gleb’s thoughtless, mischievous inscription on a stone artifact.

Attempts to rectify the situation

Having realized the reason, the schoolchildren decide to immediately erase the date from the wall. They carefully devise a plan, secretly skip classes, and make their way to the archaeological camp on their own. Arriving at the ancient wall, they see a completely clean, untouched surface. There is no inscription there, as Gleb hasn’t yet made one in their current time. The children fall into deep despair. They are trapped in a merciless reverse time flow, and with each passing day they move further and further away from the moment of their fatal mistake. The schoolchildren begin actively searching for alternative means of salvation, meticulously analyzing available information about the archaeological find and the culture of vanished civilizations.

Personal dramas of the heroes

The rewinding of time mercilessly exposes the deep personal issues of each teenager. Gleb constantly clashes with his strict military father, frequently runs away from home, and refuses to accept his father’s new girlfriend. Lena is forced to care for her younger siblings daily, working two difficult jobs due to her irresponsible, alcoholic father. Yura is grieving the recent death of his beloved grandfather. Traveling back in time gives Yura the incredible opportunity to see his grandfather alive and well again. The boy experiences mixed emotions. The joy of the warm reunion is overshadowed by the certain knowledge of the exact date of his loved one’s impending death from a sudden heart attack.

Help from a professor

Desperate friends turn to Yura’s grandfather for professional advice. The intelligent archeology professor listens attentively to their completely improbable story, dismissing it as childish fantasies. He studies the sketches of mysterious symbols on the wall and comes to a logical conclusion. The artifact is directly related to complex calendar cycles. The grandfather masterfully translates ancient script. He explains simply that Gleb placed the date next to the symbol for completion, reversing time. To safely stop the process, the date must be carefully written next to the symbol for the beginning of the cycle.

Investigation and new allies

The professor strongly advises the students to find a young specialist, Denis Sapozhnikov. The students immediately set off to another city to search for him. The long journey proves fraught with unexpected difficulties and dangers. The teenagers quickly learn to trust each other and work together as a team. Gleb boldly assumes leadership, demonstrating decisiveness in difficult conversations with adults. Lena demonstrates remarkable prudence and the ability to manage a meager budget wisely. Yura demonstrates his analytical skills. Miraculously, they manage to locate the archaeology student, who fully confirms the professor’s scientific theory and pinpoints the correct location on the stone.

Confrontation with hooligans

Against the disturbing backdrop of a temporal anomaly, the characters’ relationships with their ordinary classmates develop dynamically. Gleb openly engages in a violent conflict with the school’s biggest bully, Zhenya Mukhin. Previously, Gleb himself was often an aggressive bully, but now his life priorities have changed dramatically. He fearlessly rises to the physical defense of Yura and Lena. In one serious fight, Gleb suffers a painful injury, which disappears without a trace the next morning due to the inexorable reverse flow of time. This astonishing medical fact finally convinces the doubting boys of the full reality of what is happening. They understand the extreme gravity of their precarious situation.

Return to the wall

Gathering their last strength, the schoolchildren hastily return to the familiar excavation site. They must carefully overcome the watchful guards and approach the mystical artifact completely undetected. Gleb desperately distracts the stern guard, risking immediate capture and being sent to the police. His loyal friends Lena and Yura actively help him get closer to the stone. At the very last, critical moment, using a sharp tool carefully prepared in advance, Gleb miraculously manages to scratch the cherished numbers into the correct, safe place in the ancient cycle. A frightening energy pulse immediately erupts around them.

Time recovery

The next long-awaited morning, the tired teenagers gaze with bated breath at their home clocks and digital calendars. The happy twenty-fourth of May has arrived. Mysterious time once again flows in its correct, natural, forward direction. The boys are incredibly joyfully reunited at the bustling school. They emotionally share their fresh impressions and clearly understand that the adventures they shared have forever changed their young lives. Gleb finally finds a warm common language with his father and his kind fiancée, Vera. Lena receives reliable moral support from her new, loyal friends and successfully resolves old problems with hard work. Yura wisely comes to terms with the inevitable loss of his grandfather.

True friendship

Harsh shared trials have forged a strong bond between these completely different and dissimilar teenagers. Three ordinary schoolchildren, who previously barely interacted and even slightly disliked each other, have become best, inseparable friends. They have bravely navigated a very difficult, thorny path from cold mutual misunderstanding to warm, deep trust. A shared mystical secret has forever inextricably linked their young destinies. The happy young men successfully complete a challenging school year and receive good grades for the year. They look to their future with immense, bright optimism, joyfully planning to spend the entire long summer vacation exclusively together, genuinely rejoicing at each new day.