Novakova was born near Odesa. She studied architecture at Lviv Polytechnic Institute, relocated to Vinnytsia upon graduation. There, she worked as an architect at Vinnytsia Oblproekt (Regional Project) institute (1954-1960), and became the chief architect of Vinnytsia in 1960. In 1965, she became the chief architect of an architectural and planning workshop at the Vinnytsia branch of Hiprotsivilprombud (State Civil Industrial Construction).       

While Novakova’s first buildings were in “Stalinist” neoclassical style, in the 1960s she transitioned to modernism. Among her works are the building of the Vinnytsia City Committee of the Communist Party (now the Administrative Court Building, with Samuil Rabin, 1956–1957), Fountain in the Gorky Central Park of Culture and Leisure park (today Central City Recreation Park), with Samuil Rabin, 1958; “Harvest” market building, 1959-1960; buildings of Vinnytsia Polytechnic Institute, 1965–1969; Vinnytsia maternity hospital, 1969; Vinnytsia bus station, 1965; cinema “Rosiya”, 1970-71, hotel “Southern Bug”, 1970. Novakova also worked, with Samuil Rabin and G. Kravtsov, on the planning and architecture of Vyshenka microdistrict in Vinnytsia.