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A review by plantbirdwoman
Three Stations by Martin Cruz Smith
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.