First published 2007
A People's Militia investigator dies when Armenian terrorists hijack his Istanbul-bound flight and detonate it mid-air. Secret policeman Gavra Noukas and homicide detective Katja Drdova catch the case in 1975. Their boss, the mysterious career operative Brano Sev, assigns them to investigate but conceals his real agenda. Noukas and Drdova sense deception in their orders yet cannot penetrate Sev's motives. Their probe reveals the airplane bombing connects to an unsolved killing from seven years earlier, one with consequences that reach far beyond a single death. As the investigation deepens, the political machinery of Eastern Europe's surveillance state grinds against personal loyalties. Steinhauer brings his acclaimed crime series into the mid-1970s, where the revolution's early fervor has hardened into bureaucratic control and individual lives bend under the weight of state secrets.
Genres: historical-fiction, mystery, crime, action, political-thriller
Vibes: dark, fast-paced, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: deception, enemies-to-lovers, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Armenia, Eastern Europe, Istanbul, Moscow
Period: 1975
304 pages · Paperback · Minotaur Books
Content warnings: violence