About the book: 2021 / We met often, and I learned a lot from him: he was a man of deep education, a sharp mind and a broad soul. His novel WHO IF NOT YOU? I read it in the manuscript. I was shocked. This became a milestone in my life. Subsequently, I learned more than once that it was not only mine. I keep in my memory the testimony of two wonderful women - Maya Ulanovskaya and Dora Shturman. Both of them went through prisons and camps in the late 40s and early 50s for participating in the NKVD cases typical of those years about youth circles - “anti-Soviet - anti-Stalinist - Marxist organizations.” Both Maya and Dora both told me about this book by Yuri Gert - at different times, but with the same phrase, as if by agreement: “This book is about us and about me personally.” Despite numerous praiseworthy responses, Moscow publishing houses did not dare to publish this book . It was miraculously published in Alma-Ata in 1964. WHO IF NOT YOU? – Gert sent me a copy of his book with the following dedicatory inscription: “To dear Sanya Averbukh with faith that he will find the answer to this question. Yu.Gert, 25.IV.1964.»