This is a thriller, whodunnit and political allegory all rolled
into one - and given that the author is Tom Bradby, Asia
correspondent for ITN, the mix comes as no surprise. Bradby has
written three previous novels, all of them combining similar
ingredients and breaking new ground in genre-writing. The approach
has proved highly popular and there are no disappointments here.
This time the setting is St Petersburg in the bitter winter of
1917. Revolution is about to explode while the Tsar and his
Imperial blue-bloods continue gorging and dining to excess. The
Romanovs might be unaware of how perilous the situation is, but
their secret police aren't. Like a bunch of jackals they are
desperate to steer clear of trouble but happy to pick over the
carcasses of those they will betray to the masses. Of course there
is a hero in this morass. He takes the form of Sandro Ruzsky, chief
investigator of the city police. Ruzsky has just returned from a
four-year exile in Siberia, his penalty for pursuing a case his
superiors wanted him to drop. Now, back on his home patch and with
normal life disintegrating by the day, he sets about investigating
the murders of a young couple whose bodies were found on the frozen
River Neva. The girl was a nanny at the Imperial Palace, the man an
American. The brutality of their deaths shadows the political
turmoil going on in the city, but what appear to be simply two more
killings among many soon take on a bizarre aspect. Ruzsky finds he
is forced to confront his own past, and the love affair he tried to
forget. Bradby has written an intriguing tale and given it a
menacing atmosphere that marks it out as his best novel to date.
(Kirkus UK)
St. Petersburg, 1917 — the glittering capital of the Tsarist empire and a city on the brink of revolution– where the jackals of the secret police maneuver for their own survival and their aristocratic masters indulge in one final moment of hedonism.
For Sandro Ruzsky, chief investigator of the St. Petersburg police department, this decaying world provides the opportunity for a new beginning. Recently returned from a three-year banishment to Siberia (for pursuing a case his superiors would have like buried), Ruzsky is welcomed back to the city of his birth by a gruesome discovery: the bodies of a young couple found on the ice of the frozen river Neva just outside the Tsar’s Winter Palace.
The dead woman was a nanny at the palace, the man, an American from Chicago. The brutality of their deaths seems an allegory for the times, and the investigation leads Ruzsky, at every turn, dangerously close to the royal family. He is also drawn back to Maria–a beautiful ballerina he once loved and lost. While Maria is on the verge of being swept away by the revolution, Ruzsky suspects she may also be the murderer’s next target.
Pitted against a ruthless killer who relishes taunting him, Ruzsky finds himself face-to-face with his own past and the unstoppable tide of revolution as he fights to save everything he cares for. Summoning the same rich atmosphere and meticulous research that earned high praise for The Master of Rain, Tom Bradby brilliantly transports readers to St. Petersburg at the crossroads of history.
Tom Bradby is the royal correspondent for the British television network ITN. He has spent the last eight years covering British and American politics as well as conflicts in China, Ireland, Kosovo, and Indonesia. He now lives in London with his wife and three children.
From the Hardcover edition.
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