Synopses & Reviews
1919, Siberia… Deep in the unforgiving landscape a town lies under military rule, awaiting the remorseless assault of Bolsheviks along the Trans-Siberian railway. One night a stranger, Samarin, appears from the woods with a tale of escape from an Arctic prison, insisting a cannibal is on his trail. Only Anna, a beautiful young widow, trusts his story. When a local shaman is found dead, suspicion and terror engulf the isolated community, which harbours a secret of its own…
Review
"Meek's chiseled, gemlike prose feels vaguely translated, if not from Russian then directly from life itself — its smooth, shimmering surface disturbed by ominous upwellings. The reader is drawn along by a series of striking acts and incidents (Samarin inexplicably hacking off and burying the hand of a dead man), little puzzles that gradually resolve into a greater mystery that dwells deep within and far beyond the souls of Meek's meaty characters. Inviting comparison with Greene, Conrad, and Dostoyevsky, this is stunning, masterful fiction." Booklist
Review
"Set during the waning days of the Russian revolution, Meek's utterly absorbing novel (after The Museum of Doubt) captivates with its depiction of human nature in all its wartime extremes." Publishers Weekly
Review
"There are so many good things about this novel that one wants to praise it to the skies: exotic setting, well-drawn characters, historical accuracy, intriguing plot." Library Journal
About the Author
James Meek was born in London in 1962 and grew up in Dundee. The People’s Act of Love won the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, the Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year Award, was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and has been translated into more than 20 languages. He has published two collections of short stories, Last Orders and The Museum Of Doubt, and contributed to the acclaimed Rebel Inc anthologies The Children Of Albion Rovers and The Rovers Return. He has worked as a journalist since 1985, and his reporting from Iraq and about Guantanamo Bay won a number of British and international awards. In the autumn of 2001 he reported for The Guardian from Afghanistan on the war against the Taliban and the liberation of Kabul.