Zinaida Reich was one of Moscow’s brightest actresses, the wife of director Vsevolod Meyerhold, and the former partner of poet Sergei Yesenin. Outspoken and unwilling to bend to Stalin’s control of Soviet art, she became a target. In July 1939, assailants stabbed her 17 times in her apartment, in a murder widely believed to be organized by the NKVD. Her story is one of talent, courage, and the deadly consequences of speaking out under tyranny.