As part of his sociological research, Zsolt Csalog met with Bálintné Mohácsi Muka Eszter (1909-1984) in Tiszaroff, and her story immediately caught his attention. For Csalog, she was one of the last representatives of a disappearing traditional culture, which was rapidly changing at the time. Beginning in 1971, Csalog started to collaborate with her, He recorded 90 hours of conversation by the summer of 1974. After Csalog finished the manuscript in 1973, he submitted it to the Szépirodalmi Könyvkiadó with the hope of persuading it to publish the manuscript as a book. The text was rejected, however, largely because it did not meet the approval of the censors, although the Hungarian Radio broadcasted the audio version of the novel in 1974. Parasztregény was officially published in 1978, and it has been published in two other editions (1985, 1999). It was a big success and also a breakthrough in his career as a writer, although the community of Tiszaroff was reluctant to accept the book.

The main character of the novel is the narrator, aunt Eszter, who lives in Tiszatab (the original names were changed in the novel to protect the anonymity of the people involved). Aunt Eszter tells her story as a woman who leads a traditional peasant life. She recounts her family history and the history of Tiszatab simultaneously. The novel begins with World War I and ends in the present. With the exception of a single character, the story of the novel takes place in Tiszatab. The novel does not have a chronological or linear narrative. The chapters are organized around diverse topics (family life, love, and the narrator’s troubled marriage with her husband, the social order of the village, giving birth to her children, the emigration of her son, etc.)
Aunt Eszter was born at end of the 19^th century in Tiszatab, where her family had been living for decades. When she was roughly 15 years old, her studies were interrupted as a consequence of her aunt’s order, and she returned to her village. This transition had a huge impact on aunt Eszter’s life, and it gave her a new perspective (that of an educated person) on the traditional life of the Hungarian peasantry. In the novel, she reflects on this shift several times. The main events of Hungarian history (1918, 1956) are only part of the background of the novel.