Blood and Rubles

In an era of financial free-for-all in Russia, a Moscow cop deals with rampant crime in a “terrific” and “exceptional” police drama ( Detroit Free Press ). It’s the mid-nineties, and capitalism and privatization have come to Russia. As the trickle of cash turns to a torrent, bureaucrats become oligarchs, and the brutal Russian mafia is on the rise. Newfound democracy has not reduced the crime rate, and Inspector Porfiry Rostnikov, a forty-year veteran of the Moscow police department, and his colleagues have their hands full. A prominent businessman is kidnapped in broad daylight. Three children—as innocent looking as they are savage—terrorize a slum. And a house full of Czarist treasures is raided by tax police—only to have every piece vanish the following day. As criminals at all levels rush to exploit a system in confusion, “Inspector Porfiry Rostnikov is a rarity among policemen: shrewd, utterly incorruptible and destined to survive each complex political shift” ( Publishers Weekly , starred review).