Described by Nigella Lawson as a breathtaking achievement, Olia Hercules memoir Strong Roots is the story of four generations of her family through times of war, peace, invasion and exile. Strong Roots is an ode to the land, to resilience and determination, to family stories and recipes handed down through the generations, and to ideas of home and belonging. Tracing the ebb and flow, both voluntary and forced, of people across Ukraine and the surrounding regions in the 20th and 21st centuries, Hercules memoir brims with love, grief and hope and is a testament to how much the human spirit can endure. Hercules was born in Kakhovka, in the south of Ukraine. She trained at Leiths School of Food and Wine and worked as a chef de partie in restaurants, including Ottolenghi, and as a recipe developer. Her first book, Mamushka, won the Fortnum & Mason Award for best debut cookbook, and was followed by Kaukasis, Summer Kitchens and Home Food. After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, with her friend Alissa Timoshkina she co-founded #CookForUkraine, which has raised more than 2 million to date.