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cjeanne99's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Loveable characters? No
2.75
I don't know what I think about this book -
juliebcooper's review against another edition
4.0
Excellent first book of the year. Crime thriller set in a post-war, nameless Eastern European city where old enemies and new lurk around every corner, our protagonist doesn’t know who to trust, and nobody is who they seem. Looking forward to the next in the series.
adamrshields's review against another edition
Gave up
I really like Steinhauer's Tourist trilogy and I have liked, but not loved, some of his stand alone novels. This is the start of an earlier series but I just didn't get into it. Lots of people that are unlikeable. It also jumped around a bit especially early on and was kind of hard to follow. I probably would have been better of reading instead of listening to this, but I didn't care enough to read it.
I really like Steinhauer's Tourist trilogy and I have liked, but not loved, some of his stand alone novels. This is the start of an earlier series but I just didn't get into it. Lots of people that are unlikeable. It also jumped around a bit especially early on and was kind of hard to follow. I probably would have been better of reading instead of listening to this, but I didn't care enough to read it.
heritage's review against another edition
3.0
During the early part of the Cold War, an inexperienced investigator in an unnamed, fictitious Eastern European country is given a case that no one wants solved.
In an impressive, Edgar-nominated debut (Best First Novel), Olen Steinhauer gives us a mystery and a story of Cold War political intrigue, set in a country he describes as "the intersection of Poland, Slovakia, Ukraine, Hungary, and Romania." It's part one of a five book series--with each novel featuring different characters--but all revolving around the same Militia office on Yalta Boulevard in that country.
Steinhauer's narrative style is fairly spare, yet the atmosphere and the characters' personalities slowly emerge through each chapter. The mystery and tension are built up slowly, and there isn't much in the way of ridiculous, impossible-to-believe action. The protagonist is made of flesh, and he's one of the few I've read who gets hurt and stays realistically hurt. While there are a few mystery clichés present in the novel, they do relate to the plot and are not always used in the traditional sense (read the novel, you'll know what I mean).
If I were to log a complaint, it would have to be the last three chapters. The climax seemed like it couldn't decide if it wanted to be action or anti-action. Also, there was too much summing up and wrapping up for my taste. If you are a reader who likes a nice summary to explain everything at the end of the novel and have all your questions answered, then you may not be as affected by it as I was. I'd say the last three chapters caused the novel to drop from four stars to three.
Nevertheless, I do recommend this novel to fans of John le Carré, Martin Cruz Smith, Alan Furst, and Philip Kerr. I look forward to reading the next one in the sequence.
In an impressive, Edgar-nominated debut (Best First Novel), Olen Steinhauer gives us a mystery and a story of Cold War political intrigue, set in a country he describes as "the intersection of Poland, Slovakia, Ukraine, Hungary, and Romania." It's part one of a five book series--with each novel featuring different characters--but all revolving around the same Militia office on Yalta Boulevard in that country.
Steinhauer's narrative style is fairly spare, yet the atmosphere and the characters' personalities slowly emerge through each chapter. The mystery and tension are built up slowly, and there isn't much in the way of ridiculous, impossible-to-believe action. The protagonist is made of flesh, and he's one of the few I've read who gets hurt and stays realistically hurt. While there are a few mystery clichés present in the novel, they do relate to the plot and are not always used in the traditional sense (read the novel, you'll know what I mean).
If I were to log a complaint, it would have to be the last three chapters. The climax seemed like it couldn't decide if it wanted to be action or anti-action. Also, there was too much summing up and wrapping up for my taste. If you are a reader who likes a nice summary to explain everything at the end of the novel and have all your questions answered, then you may not be as affected by it as I was. I'd say the last three chapters caused the novel to drop from four stars to three.
Nevertheless, I do recommend this novel to fans of John le Carré, Martin Cruz Smith, Alan Furst, and Philip Kerr. I look forward to reading the next one in the sequence.
rojo25's review against another edition
4.0
I liked this book. First, the cast of characters and the relationship among them is intriguing. But, it’s the time and place of the story. Nobody wants to share any information and it’s literally a frightening place to live. I recommend.
viktoriya's review
3.0
I liked the first half of the book and then it kind of went downhill for me. Something in the book made me loose all interest and it happened really sudden too. It wasn't a specific scene or a plot twist (there wasn't even really a plot twist) Also, the audio book narrator was annoying with his fake accents. Probably that's what killed the book for me in the end.
aszekely's review against another edition
2.0
The atmospherics of the book were excellent. Steinhauer deeply researched life in post-World War II Eastern Europe at the start of the Cold War and it shows. But, the plot and characters were lacking. The plot twists were not terribly original and the characters were two dimensional. After liking [b:The Tourist|4590265|The Tourist|Olen Steinhauer|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1312063136s/4590265.jpg|4639728] so much, I had high hopes for this book, but was left feeling disappointed.
martyfried's review
4.0
Another winner by Olen Steinhauer. I've enjoyed all the books I've read by this author, and I'm happy to see there's more in this series. The main character in this book is a strange young man named Emil Brod, a new homicide inspector in some Eastern European country in 1948 who doesn't know when to quit. He goes after some higher up politico that has the power to just have someone shot without any apparent consequences, something he demonstrates pretty dramatically, though fortunately unsuccessfully, with Brod, who is told to drop the case. But he can't do that, because the book would be pretty uninteresting if he did. But the good news is that all the people he works with (and for) no longer seem to hate him after this happens, and he even becomes friendly with some, including the one who kicked him in the testicles earlier in the story.