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Original Essays | June 27, 2009

Fran Cannon Slayton: IMG On Wakes and Rum (and Coke)



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Murder on the Leviathan

by Boris Akunin

Murder on the Leviathan Cover

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Paris, 1878: Eccentric antiquarian Lord Littleby and his ten servants are found murdered in Littleby’s mansion on the rue de Grenelle, and a priceless Indian shawl is missing. Police commissioner “Papa” Gauche recovers only one piece of evidence from the crime scene: a golden key shaped like a whale. Gauche soon deduces that the key is in fact a ticket of passage for the Leviathan, a gigantic steamship soon to depart Southampton on its maiden voyage to Calcutta. The murderer must be among its passengers.

In Cairo, the ship is boarded by a young Russian diplomat with a shock of white hair—none other than Erast Fandorin, the celebrated detective of Boris Akunin’s The Winter Queen. The sleuth joins forces with Gauche to determine which of ten unticketed passengers on the Leviathan is the rue de Grenelle killer.

Tipping his hat to Agatha Christie, Akunin assembles a colorful cast of suspects—including a secretive Japanese doctor, a professor who specializes in rare Indian artifacts, a pregnant Swiss woman, and an English aristocrat with an appetite for collecting Asian treasures—all of whom are con?ned together until the crime is solved. As the Leviathan steams toward Calcutta, will Fandorin be able to out-investigate Gauche and discover who the killer is, even as the ship’s passengers are murdered, one by one?

Already an international sensation, Boris Akunin’s latest page-turner transports the reader back to the glamorous, dangerous past in a richly atmospheric tale of suspense on the high seas.

From the Hardcover edition.

Review:

“Marries old-fashioned manners to a nonstop array of plot twists to rival the best detective tales. The Winter Queen is an energetic hands-down winner.”

People

Review:

“Murder on the Leviathan harks back gratifyingly to the cerebral nature of this genre. . . . A nostalgically civilized spirit, even in the presence of murder.”

The New York Times

Review:

“Intricate and marvelous . . . addictively dazzling . . . Akunin’s agile leaps of time, tone, and narrative style are matched by a frisky erudition: The book itself is a luxury literary cruise.”

Entertainment Weekly

Review:

“Akunin’s prose is clean and swift, pausing only to set a scene with a few well-chosen details before resuming the hairpin curves of the action. If Pushkin had tried his hand at detective ?ction, it might have turned out something like this.”

The New York Times Book Review

Review:

“A tasty dish...There are secret panels, hidden tunnels, a false mustache, intercepted letters, gun?ghts, and a glamorous female villain....Akunin knows how to build suspense, but he also enjoys himself; he shows the reader a good time.”

The Boston Globe

Review:

“[Akunin’s Erast Fandorin] novels feature a Slavic Sherlock Holmes who speaks Japanese and English, is skilled at martial arts and has lady-killer good looks....Millions of readers have been seduced by the books’ elegant style and classy, retro feel.”

The Wall Street Journal

About the Author

BORIS AKUNIN is the pen name of Grigory Chkhartishvili, who was born in the republic of Georgia in 1956. A philologist, critic, essayist, and translator of Japanese, he published his first detective stories in 1998 and quickly became one of the most widely read authors in Russia. He has written ten Erast Fandorin novels to date, which have sold more than eight million copies in Russia and been translated into nearly two dozen languages. He lives in Moscow.

From the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

ISBN:
9780812968798
Translator:
Bromfield, Andrew
Publisher:
Random House Trade
Translator:
Bromfield, Andrew
Author:
Akunin, Boris
Author:
Akunin, B.
Subject:
General
Subject:
Art
Subject:
Police
Subject:
Mystery & Detective - Historical
Subject:
Mystery fiction
Subject:
Criminal investigation
Publication Date:
February 2005
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Pages:
240
Dimensions:
8.06x5.24x.51 in. .40 lbs.

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