Few 20-year-olds can boast two published books, but Ksenia Buksha, a native and resident of St. Petersburg, claims to have written many times that number. Her first book, a collection of three novellas titled "Alyonka the Guerilla Girl," incited rave reviews in most literary-minded publications. And the St. Petersburg publishing house Amphora has just issued her second, "The House We'll Build."

Critics tend to dwell on details that have little to do with the books' literary merits, and much to do with Buksha's stats -- her age, her sex and her good looks. Even Alexander Zhitinsky, Buksha's literary agent and the godfather to a whole generation of young writers, has advertised his client as an exception to what he calls the ideal novelist, who is "over 30, and preferably male." Interviewers repeatedly ask Buksha whether writing books is a suitable occupation for so young and attractive a girl. All of which seems strange today, not least in Russia, where women writers dominate the literary market. Nonplused by just such a question, Buksha told an interviewer from L'Officiel that "a young and beautiful girl should indeed engage in arts. It makes her even more beautiful."

Another detail that the critics find juicy is Buksha's anarchist streak, especially in "Alyonka." That short novel is set in an imaginary post-capitalist Slavic Empire, a world divided into three parts by "corporations," with centers in New York, Beijing and Istanbul. Alyonka brings together a group of guerillas to attack the regime and assassinate the state leader, whose description betrays a hint or two of Vladimir Putin. Buksha was surprised to find reviewers equating Alyonka with herself. A student of economics at St. Petersburg University, Buksha claims that her own views are firmly rooted in traditional middle-class values.

"The House We'll Build" tells the story of a genius whose inventions change his life and everything else around him. Though formally set in St. Petersburg, the book stays away from recognizable details -- and this, more than anything, betrays Buksha's youth. She invents her worlds for lack of confidence in picturing the real one. Buksha also peppered this novel with her verse, in which she takes special pride. In the L'Officiel interview, she said that there were few poems like hers in the Russian tradition. To put it mildly, she was wrong.

One can hardly imagine a more presentable showcase for Russia's literary youth than Ksenia Buksha -- educated, articulate, smart, finance-savvy. A middle-class writer with a harmless rebel touch. Time will tell whether there is anything of lasting literary value behind the display.