Stalin’s Ghost

Arkady Renko is back in Martin Cruz Smith‘s Stalin’s Ghost, a superlative look at Russia today. Bands of racist thugs roam the streets, idolizing the veterans of the second Chechen war, while vilifying the losers of the first. Russian society is painted as a world seesawing between the sane who’ve remembered their manners and the insane who’ve intentionally forgotten everything they’ve learned in a desperate attempt to restore their dignity and fallen pride. In the midst of this national emotional meltdown, Stalin’s ghost is seen at a metro station in Moscow.

Renko is called in to investigate, for Stalin is still a revered figure, despite the atrocities. Perhaps the current hardships make Stalin’s receding figure in the rearview mirror of history an especially roseate one. But Renko is a hard man, prowling the mean streets of the motherland, not swayed by fascist idiocy or neo-liberal excesses. The clues behind Stalin’s eidolon take him to Tver, a city on the outskirts of Moscow, a place famous for heroism during World War II. Tver is overrun by the same fascist goons Renko suspects of orchestrating the Stalin phantasms, but to what end? Add a dollop of personal intrigue when it’s revealed that Renko’s current lover still fans the flames of previous passion for one of the Chechen veterans and our plot is complete.

Smith’s Russia is equal parts nihilistic wasteland, opportunistic mail-order brides and forlorn survivors scrabbling for purchase on the slippery tiles of depression. Not too far from the truth either, I reckon, based on what I’ve heard from certain folks. Another excellent book from Smith, similar to Gorky Park. Read and enjoy!

ISBN: 978-0-7432-7673-3