First published 2009
Moscow, 1953. Leo Demidov serves as an officer in Stalin's security apparatus, a war hero devoted to the Soviet state. The system demands absolute loyalty and insists that crime cannot exist in their perfect society. Yet Leo begins to question everything when authorities cover up a child's death. Evidence points to a serial killer targeting children, but the state refuses to acknowledge the murders. Leo's world fractures further when his superiors order him to spy on his own wife Raisa, suspected of disloyalty. Choosing love over duty, Leo and Raisa flee to a remote village deep in the Ural Mountains. There, Leo discovers the same pattern of child murders has followed them. The killer remains free, hunting children while the state maintains its deadly fiction. Leo and Raisa decide to pursue the murderer themselves, knowing this choice will brand them enemies of the regime. Their hunt for justice becomes a fight for survival in a system that destroys anyone who dares to see the truth.
Genres: historical-fiction, 20th-century, mystery, crime, thriller, political-thriller
Vibes: dark, emotional, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Moscow, Ural Mountains
Period: 1953
380 pages · Paperback · Norstedts
Content warnings: child-death, murder, violence