I can't remember the last time I read a book as suspenseful as Tom Rob Smith's Child 44, which is due to be released at the end of this month. I don't just mean a thriller like Jo Nesbo's The Redbreast, which I read recently and thoroughly enjoyed, finding it hard to put down. I mean the sort of suspense where you cover your eyes because you're too afraid to look--heart stopping suspense. I realize this probably sounds silly. How can any book be like that? And in my experience I don't think I've read many of this type of intensity. That was my reaction to this book, however. It was so tautly plotted that I had to set it aside a few times, but I could never leave it alone for long.
I've always been intrigued by the Soviet Union and its history. I've read about their bloody wars and revolutions, and it was the perfect setting for this story. Set in 1953 under Stalin's reign of terror, murders are occurring. Someone's murdering the country's children. Only there is no such thing as crime in a society built on the revolutionary spirit of its people. People who valiantly fought Fascism. A society built on ideals. And few buy into this more than Leo Stepanovich Demidov, an up-and-coming member of the MGB--the State Security Force. Leo is a pillar of society. He fought in the war and was a decorated hero. He believes in his country and its leaders absolutely. And he leads the perfect life with the perfect wife.
When the young son of a colleague in the MGB is killed, Leo is asked to smooth things over. The grieving family calls it murder, but everyone else calls it a tragic accident. The boy was discovered by a set of railroad tracks. It can't be murder, because there is no crime in the Soviet Union. It's like a dirty secret that everyone is in on. Everyone knows the tactics the MGB uses, and you don't argue. Everyone knows what happens to people who question and argue. They end up in gulags, or exiled, or worse--dead. There are too many inconsistencies, however, and Leo begins having doubts. His doubts get him into trouble. He'll find that everything he believed in, his relationships even, were built on lies and secrets. I won't tell you anymore, as the excitement of the story is having it all play out in front of you.
Smith even achieves his suspense with a minimum of gore and blood. Well, I won't say there isn't any, because there are a few unpleasant scenes, but nothing felt too over the top to me. I wasn't sure what to expect with a novel about a serial killer. It was in many ways very disturbing. I almost found the atmosphere these people were living in more disturbing than the murders, however. The tension didn't just come from the idea of a killer on the loose, but from Leo trying to navigate under such a repressive system. He had few friends or allies, and it is impossible to know who to trust. There are lots of twists and turns and some might not have worked in any other novel, but in the Soviet Union of 1953, a society built on fear and mistrust, they were entirely imaginable.
Smith based his novel on real-life killer, Andrei Chikatilo. Check out the book trailer here. And there is an interesting interview with the author here. If you're in the mood for a well written, very suspenseful story, this is one I highly recommend. And it appears Smith is currently working on a sequel!