An authoritative but skewed look at recent Russian history.
Part fiction and part freewheeling analysis, an insider's look at the world of Vladimir Putin.
The book's narrator is Vadim Baranov, a fictional stand-in for Vladislav Surkov, the young ideologue and spin doctor known as "Putin's Rasputin." Baranov becomes attached to Putin in the late 1990s, when Putin is the largely unknown head of the FSB. With his background in theater and television, Baranov becomes part of media-savvy billionaire Boris Berezovsky's campaign to promote Putin as a strong, decisive, fear-inspiring replacement for the boozing, ideologically soft Boris Yeltsin. The Russian people, Putin's supporters say, crave a return to the time when the Kremlin "set the tone" and "had a certain moral superiority over the private sector." And also when cell phones didn't ring during performances of the Bolshoi Ballet. Culturally hip with references to Sex and the City, Johnny Depp, and Putin's appearance on Larry King Live, the cooly detached Baranov is less interested in exposing the sins of the president, to whom he refers as tsar, than tossing off pithy observations, opinions, and hard insights in what amounts to an epic monologue. With elements of Baranov's personal life mixed into the narrative, the book can be quite entertaining—though not for those unhappy with Baranov's essentially admiring portrait of Putin, which da Empoli, who was an advisor to former Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, does little to diffuse. First published in 2022 in France and then Italy, this bestselling, prize-winning quasi-novel was viewed by some as dangerous propaganda at a time when Putin was waging war in Ukraine. "Power is like the sun, like death: you can’t look at it head-on," the author writes, highlighting one of his own shortcomings.
An authoritative but skewed look at recent Russian history.Pub Date: Oct. 31, 2023
ISBN: 9781635423952
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Other Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.
A medical student is assigned an overnight shift to observe a Long Island hospital’s psychiatric ward and help with emergencies. You’d never guess what happens next.
Amy Brenner isn’t even interested in psychiatry, the one medical specialty she’s never considered for her own career. Nor is she interested any more in Cameron Berger, the classmate who ended their relationship so that he could spend more time studying, and she’s not pleased to learn that he’s switched his rotation with another student so he can spend some of the next 13 hours persuading Amy to rekindle their romance. Predictably, Cam will be the least of Amy’s troubles. Apart from Dr. Richard Beck and nurse Ramona Dutton, everyone else on Ward D is much more dangerous, from elderly Mary Cummings, whose knitting needles aren’t plastic but sharpened steel, to William Schoenfeld, who’s stopped taking the medications that were supposed to silence the voices telling him to kill people, to Damon Sawyer, who’s confined in Seclusion One and can’t possibly escape, unless a power outage neutralizes the locks. Most threatening of all is Jade Carpenter, whose close friendship with Amy ended eight years ago when Amy turned her in for what ended up being only one of a whole series of thrill crimes. McFadden measures out the complications, revelations, and betrayals with such an expert hand that readers anxiously trying to figure out whom Amy can trust as her goal shifts from ticking off a toilsome requirement to surviving the night may well end up wondering whom they can trust themselves. And isn’t provoking that kind of paranoia what medical thrillers are all about?
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.Pub Date: March 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227271
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
Soapy, suspenseful fun.
A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.
Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.
Soapy, suspenseful fun.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227325
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
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