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tasmanian_bibliophile's review against another edition
3.0
‘Life is unfair. Why should death be any different?’
This is the seventh novel to feature Arkady Renko, a series which began in 1981 with ‘Gorky Park’. Renko was a young officer on the way up in ‘Gorky Park’, in ‘Three Stations’ he is on the way down. Technically, Renko has been suspended from the prosecutor’s office and is about to be forced out by superiors uncomfortable with the way in which he continues to inconveniently solve cases and bring the guilty to account.
The novel opens with Maya, a teenage mother, travelling to Moscow by train. Maya is fleeing from the past and is looking for a better life for her and her baby. Maya is rescued from a soldier by an older woman – but then awakens in the Three Stations train station at the Komsomol Square deprived of both her daughter and her possessions. Zhenya, the fifteen year old orphan previously rescued by Renko (‘Wolves Eat Dogs’), tries to help her.
At the same time, Renko is helping Victor Orlov investigate a suspicious death in a derelict trailer in another area of Three Stations. It seems that the dead woman is a prostitute and most likely dead of a drug overdose. This, for his superiors, is enough to rule out homicide. Renko does not agree and his subsequent investigations, even after he is fired, reveal a complex case.
I read this novel in one sitting, caught up in Smith’s vivid and gritty description of a corrupt and dysfunctional Moscow. The dual storylines: Renko trying to solve a murder; and Zhenya and Maya searching for baby Katya showcase the contrasts in a Moscow where gangs of homeless children co-exist together with the corruptly wealthy who can buy anything – including children - for a price.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
This is the seventh novel to feature Arkady Renko, a series which began in 1981 with ‘Gorky Park’. Renko was a young officer on the way up in ‘Gorky Park’, in ‘Three Stations’ he is on the way down. Technically, Renko has been suspended from the prosecutor’s office and is about to be forced out by superiors uncomfortable with the way in which he continues to inconveniently solve cases and bring the guilty to account.
The novel opens with Maya, a teenage mother, travelling to Moscow by train. Maya is fleeing from the past and is looking for a better life for her and her baby. Maya is rescued from a soldier by an older woman – but then awakens in the Three Stations train station at the Komsomol Square deprived of both her daughter and her possessions. Zhenya, the fifteen year old orphan previously rescued by Renko (‘Wolves Eat Dogs’), tries to help her.
At the same time, Renko is helping Victor Orlov investigate a suspicious death in a derelict trailer in another area of Three Stations. It seems that the dead woman is a prostitute and most likely dead of a drug overdose. This, for his superiors, is enough to rule out homicide. Renko does not agree and his subsequent investigations, even after he is fired, reveal a complex case.
I read this novel in one sitting, caught up in Smith’s vivid and gritty description of a corrupt and dysfunctional Moscow. The dual storylines: Renko trying to solve a murder; and Zhenya and Maya searching for baby Katya showcase the contrasts in a Moscow where gangs of homeless children co-exist together with the corruptly wealthy who can buy anything – including children - for a price.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
shawntowner's review against another edition
3.0
A decent read, but it doesn't deal with the abusive violence of the sex industry as well as [b:Box 21|1437993|Box 21|Anders Roslund|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1194215026s/1437993.jpg|1428570], nor does it capture the pointless and ineffective police bureaucracy as well as [b:Child 44|2161733|Child 44|Tom Rob Smith|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255690645s/2161733.jpg|2167258].
kfrench1008's review against another edition
4.0
I love the Renko novels, and this is the best since Polar Star. Nice to see Arkady back on the streets of Moscow.
ansherina's review against another edition
3.0
I quite enjoyed reading this apart from all the young adult fiction I usually indulge myself in however it got a bit confusing at times. Despite this, the general idea and storyline is clever.
plantbirdwoman's review against another edition
3.0
The mean streets of Moscow have never appeared meaner than in this latest of the Arkady Renko mysteries. Beset with organized crime, desperate immigrants from the far reaches of the country, abandoned or runaway children, and, presiding over it all, a bureaucracy that does its best to see and hear no evil. Arkady is a part of the bureaucracy, but a very inconvenient part. He does see and hear evil and he speaks it, too. He insists that very bad things are happening in Moscow and that they need to be investigated and stopped. For his efforts, he is suspended. Or is it terminated? In this netherworld, things are always a bit murky.
The plot here revolves around an elegant young woman who is found dead in a run-down filthy trailer at the Three Stations, train stations in the city. The bureaucracy wants to put it down to an overdose by a prostitute, but the whole thing looks wrong to Renko. He keeps pushing and pushing until he comes to suspect that this is not a single death but a series of murders. A serial murderer in Moscow? This the authorities cannot permit! But whether he is suspended or terminated, or whatever, Renko can't stop investigating and following the clues to the bitter end.
Meanwhile, Renko's "genius" chess-playing teenage unofficial ward, Zhenya, has met a young unwed mother who arrived on one of the trains at Three Stations. Maya is an unwed mother without a baby. Her three-week-old baby has been stolen while she was on the train and she is frantic to find her. Zhenya joins her in her search to help her and to protect her from the predatory gangs that rove Three Stations.
A third strand of the story follows the baby, Katya. Stolen from her mother while she slept on the train, she is sold to a couple who are about to leave Moscow, but it turns out these people have no idea what to do with a real live human baby. They had been in love with the idea of a baby. They soon abandon her in a shoe box at the Stations. She is found by a group of young children who have banded together for protection. They accept her as one of their own and seek to protect her, too.
Smith interweaves all these strands of his story along with interactions with the oligarchy that is so much a part of the emergent Russian economy and political life. It is a fascinating story and is extensively researched and well-written as Smith's books always are. I would have given it even higher marks, but as the plot kept switching back and forth between characters, I found myself a bit lost at times. Nevertheless, it was a good read and I certainly recommend it to fans of the genre.
The plot here revolves around an elegant young woman who is found dead in a run-down filthy trailer at the Three Stations, train stations in the city. The bureaucracy wants to put it down to an overdose by a prostitute, but the whole thing looks wrong to Renko. He keeps pushing and pushing until he comes to suspect that this is not a single death but a series of murders. A serial murderer in Moscow? This the authorities cannot permit! But whether he is suspended or terminated, or whatever, Renko can't stop investigating and following the clues to the bitter end.
Meanwhile, Renko's "genius" chess-playing teenage unofficial ward, Zhenya, has met a young unwed mother who arrived on one of the trains at Three Stations. Maya is an unwed mother without a baby. Her three-week-old baby has been stolen while she was on the train and she is frantic to find her. Zhenya joins her in her search to help her and to protect her from the predatory gangs that rove Three Stations.
A third strand of the story follows the baby, Katya. Stolen from her mother while she slept on the train, she is sold to a couple who are about to leave Moscow, but it turns out these people have no idea what to do with a real live human baby. They had been in love with the idea of a baby. They soon abandon her in a shoe box at the Stations. She is found by a group of young children who have banded together for protection. They accept her as one of their own and seek to protect her, too.
Smith interweaves all these strands of his story along with interactions with the oligarchy that is so much a part of the emergent Russian economy and political life. It is a fascinating story and is extensively researched and well-written as Smith's books always are. I would have given it even higher marks, but as the plot kept switching back and forth between characters, I found myself a bit lost at times. Nevertheless, it was a good read and I certainly recommend it to fans of the genre.
slapshottechnology's review against another edition
3.0
Typical Renko, it seems he is stumbling bumbling, but his wit keeps him in the game. I liked seeing the expanded role for Zhenya.
bishop's review
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
richardwells's review against another edition
2.0
It pains me to give An Arkady Renko Novel a meager two stars, but Martin Cruz Smith has put out a book that falls short of his usual great work. It remains true that Mr. Smith paints a picture of modern Russia that is as disturbing, maybe more disturbing, than Dickens' London. And his characters in their broken heroism are as compelling as ever. Arkady Renko is an existential mess; his partner, is a late stage alcoholic who lurches into functionality, but only just barely, his ward is a highly functioning autistic street kid rescued from Chernobyl; and now there's a teenage prostitute whose child is kidnapped, and who sets the plot into motion. This sort of family bouncing one off the other, its contrast with street families of adolescent and teenage homeless, and the odyssey of the kidnapped kid make for a great read, but that story is joined with the hunt for a serial killer, and the two parts don't really make a whole. The murders are barely interesting , the excesses of the new oligarchy (a Smith specialty) are old-hat, as is Renko's constant struggle with the police hierarchy.
I could have easily done without the serial killer, and with a deeper story around the lost baby, but that wasn't the author's choice, and though he brought the lost baby story to an interesting conclusion the denouement was forced. The serial killer piece was resolved with deus ex machina - a cheap way out, unrealistic, and totally unsatisfying. Mr. Cruz Smith seemed to run out of steam, and so did the book.
Arkady Renko and his brood remain some of my favorite characters, too bad they didn't get a better story this time out.
I could have easily done without the serial killer, and with a deeper story around the lost baby, but that wasn't the author's choice, and though he brought the lost baby story to an interesting conclusion the denouement was forced. The serial killer piece was resolved with deus ex machina - a cheap way out, unrealistic, and totally unsatisfying. Mr. Cruz Smith seemed to run out of steam, and so did the book.
Arkady Renko and his brood remain some of my favorite characters, too bad they didn't get a better story this time out.
psteve's review against another edition
3.0
It's been a long time since I read one of these books. Renko is, not surprisingly, disillusioned with the workings of the police force in Moscow, and is about to resign when he is drawn into the case of a prostitute to dies with no outward sign of a reason for her death. Renko is forced to resign when he continues his investigation. Meanwhile, a young woman Maya is looking for her young baby who was taken from her on a train. The stories dovetail nicely, the portrayal of modern Moscow is deep and depressing.