A Moscow cop is left out in the cold in this 'impressive' Edgar Award winner for Best Mystery Novel (The Washington Post Book World).
When forced to choose between the law and the party line, Police Inspector Porfiry Rostnikov has a disturbing tendency to fight for justice, and that has won him no friends at the Kremlin. Now his enemies in the KGB have arranged a transfer to the lowest rungs of Moscow law enforcement, a backwater department assigned to only the most hopeless cases, one of which is about to take Rostnikov deep into Siberia.
A corrupt commissar has been stabbed through the eye with an icicle. A murder at this level should be a top priority, but Rostnikov gets the distinct impression that the powers-that-be would prefer this case go unsolved-and that Rostnikov not survive this Siberian winter.
This thrilling crime novel features 'the best cop to come out of the Soviet Union since Martin Cruz Smith's Arkady Renko' (San Francisco Examiner).
After a lifetime in service to the Soviet Union, police inspector Porfiry Rostnikov may have found a way out. A high-profile homicide leads him to a cache of documents packed full of incriminating Kremlin gossip, which he uses as a bargaining chip to secure exit visas for himself and his Jewish wife. But just before the deal is concluded, Brezhnev's death sends the nation into turmoil, and makes escape impossible. His career derailed, the veteran cop is reduced to investigating penny-ante murders-one of which may lead somewhere very big indeed.
An elderly Jewish man is shot to death in his bathtub by killers who steal nothing but a worthless brass candlestick. And as the brutal Moscow summer wears on, the police find themselves the targets of car thieves and snipers. With the help of his two faithful lieutenants, Karpo and Tkach, Rostnikov needs to find a way to solve these cases and salvage his good name-if it doesn't cost him his life.
Tension runs high as a Moscow cop investigates murder under the big top-from the Edgar Award-winning 'Ed McBain of Mother Russia' (Kirkus Reviews).
Porfiry Rostnikov was one of the top detectives in Moscow-until he crossed the KGB. On the orders of the secret service, this bulldog cop is busted down to the minor crimes unit, where his talents are utterly wasted. When a drunk climbs the statue of Nikolai Gogol in Arbat Square and threatens to kill himself, Rostnikov tries to talk the man down. But with a perfect somersault, acrobat Valerian Duznetzov leaps from the statue-the final jump of a storied career.
Across town, Duznetzov's partner, Oleg, practices his trapeze routine high above the circus floor. After letting go of the bars and going into a perfect double flip, Oleg falls, expecting the net to catch him. But the net has been sabotaged, and Oleg dies. As Rostnikov digs into this strange pair of deaths, he finds dark secrets inside the Moscow circus-secrets sure to grab the attention of his old friends at the KGB.
A Soviet cop stars in this novel of 'sweaty-palmed suspense . . . Equal parts likeable characters and believable dangers' (The Washington Post Book World).
The Moscow Film Festival is in town, and the elite artists of the East and West have convened at the legendary Metropole Hotel to drink, gossip, and flirt. But the party is about to come crashing down. Four men-one American, one Japanese, and two Russians-will all be dead by morning, poisoned.
To keep the killings under wraps, the Kremlin hands the investigation over to the famously discreet police investigator Porfiry Rostnikov. A hard-boiled cop with more than three decades' experience navigating the deadly jungle of the Soviet bureaucracy, Rostnikov is about to find himself both in the international spotlight and in the crosshairs of a terrorist, who is targeting foreigners to embarrass the Soviet state and will happily sacrifice any Russian who gets in the way.
This Edgar Award-nominated follow-up to Death of a Dissident confirms Stuart Kaminsky's status as 'the Ed McBain of Mother Russia' (Kirkus Reviews).
The uniformed man standing before Toby Peters is General Douglas MacArthur, a soldier who considers himself the only man who can defeat the Japanese. But though he may be all-powerful in the South Pacific, today he is in Los Angeles with a problem only a detective can solve. The general has an eye on a postwar promotion to the White House, and an aide has stolen his war chest, his donor list, and a handful of embarrassing private letters. To get them back, Toby may need some help. Lucky for him, he's just met Dashiell Hammett, one of the finest crime novelists of all time. Dodging his mistress while he's waiting to rejoin the army, Dash needs amusement and thinks Toby's case sounds like a lark.
In fact, the assignment proves dangerous. Toby isn't a soldier, but he soon finds he just might end up dying at a general's whim nonetheless.
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A killer terrorizes the San Francisco opera, and the maestro calls in Los Angeles detective Toby Peters to investigate-which might just set him up to be the next victim.
Inspector Porfiry Petrovich Rostnikov is an honest policeman in a very dishonest post-Soviet Union. He and his team are searching for a serial killer who has claimed at least forty victims. And then there is the problem of protecting a visiting British journalist who is working on a story about a Moscow prostitution ring--in doing so Rostnikov and his team uncover a chain of murders that lead to a source too high to be held accountable if the police want to keep their jobs--or their lives.
Lovable everyman Lew Fonesca, the Man Who Makes Things Work in Sarasota, is once again faced with cases that try his patience and test his sanity. A local curmudgeon who has been campaigning to end state-sponsored school funding is brutally killed. A recent graduate of a public high school for the gifted is arrested for the crime and turns to Lew for help. A semiretired and much beloved singer of children’s songs is being anonymously pushed to leave Sarasota, threatened with exposure as a sexual predator. It is up to Lew to uncover the blackmailer and determine whether there is any truth to the accusation. Lew has decided that life is worth more than just going through the motions. But will the good life that Lew so richly deserves elude him as he uncovers some very sad truths? His final choice: do the right thing and see his happiness evaporate … or betray a trust and stay happy....
“Kaminsky provides enough twists and turns to keep most readers guessing, but the books power comes from the compelling portrayal of Fonseca, who still suffers emotionally from his wife's death, but continues to strive to move forward.”--Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Inspector Rostnikov is a Russian bear of a man, an honest policeman in a very dishonest post-Soviet Russia. Known as “The Washtub,” Rostnikov is one of the most engaging and relevant characters in crime fiction, a sharp and caring policeman as well as the perfect tour guide to a changing (that is, disintegrating) Russia. Surviving pogroms and politburos, he has solved crimes, mostly in spite of the powers that rule his world. In People Who Walk in Darkness, Rostnikov travels to Siberia to investigate a murder at a diamond mine, where he discovers an old secret—and an even older personal problem. His compatriots head to Kiev on a trail of smuggled diamonds and kidnapped guest workers, and what they discover leads them to a vast conspiracy that not only has international repercussions but threatens them on a very personal level.
“One of the better contemporary examples of an honest policeman navigating the shoals of a corrupt society…The particularly high stakes make this one of Rostnikov’s more exciting investigations.” --Publishers Weekly
Four years ago Lew Fonesca’s wife was struck and killed in a hit-and-run within sight of their apartment. He fled Chicago, driving mindlessly until his car gave up the ghost in Sarasota, FL. Working from a cheap office behind the Dairy Queen on Highway 301, he makes a threadbare living as a process server and savors his clinical depression like a fine wine. Then his therapist, who alternately acts as his conscience and his sparring partner, tells him it’s time he goes back to Chicago and closes the door to the past so that he can finally get on with the rest of his life. Lew hates to admit it, but he’s beginning to see her point. So Lew returns to his home town, to friends and family—and to a grief that threatens to engulf him. He’s resolved to dig until he finds out who killed his wife. In doing so, he’ll uncover both sweet and painful memories of his past. He’ll also confront a murderer who’ll not hesitate to kill again to make sure hidden secrets stay buried.
“Kaminsky has a knack for creating oddball characters in rollicking plots.”--Booklist
Lew Fonseca is a man who does things for people. He makes small problems go away and tries to keep the larger ones from landing his clients in jail. He finds deadbeats, errant spouses, and generally keeps the populace of Sarasota on the up-and-up.
New Lew is faced with one case that will try his patience…and another that may break his heart.
The first involves an elderly woman who swears she's witnessed a murder in her old-age home despite the fact that everyone she tells her story to, her family, the hospital staff, and finally the cops, all tell her that it just couldn't have happened.
The other has Lew trying to find out the identity of a hit-and-run driver who killed a fourteen-year-old boy. This task dredges up old memories and a lot of pain, for Lew fled Chicago years ago, after a drunk driver killed his beloved wife.
As Lew begins to dig deeper into both cases, he finds that they are tied together in ways he can't hope to untangle.
And when someone tries to run him down, Lew knows that he's getting close to some nasty home truths and he is going to have to get the answers if he is to survive.
Lew Fonesca is a Sarasota part-time process server still mourning his dead wife and trying to get through life without any complications. But his life is full of them. His shrink wants him to dump his grief so he can have more of a life; a pretty social worker who has helped
him in the past wants to deepen their friendship; and his big heart prevents him from saying no to people who need his help. A distraught father comes to Lew to track down his wife and two kids, whom Lew suspects ran off with the man's best friend. When people start showing up dead, Lew knows he's in way over his head, and this time he may not be able to make it come out okay
