Synopses & Reviews
"If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country."
E. M. Forster
Through seven previous novels, Reggie Nadelson has created one of the more memorable characters in detective fiction: Artie Cohen, New York police detective and first-generation American with complex ties to his Russian past, especially his close friendship with the enigmatic and flamboyant New York/London club owner Tolya Sverdloff. Now, in Londongrad — by far Nadelson's most ambitious novel to date — Artie is faced with a murder that strikes at him personally and will ultimately place his best friend's life in his hands as it challenges his own loyalty.
In a playground in Brooklyn, Artie is led to a dead girl tied up in duct tape on a children's swing. He soon realizes the killer murdered the wrong girl--the intended victim was Valentina Sverdloff, Tolya's daughter, long adored by Artie. Artie flies to London to tell Tolya and finds himself enmeshed on his friend's behalf in a maelstrom of Russian money and crime. Like Berlin at the end of World War II, somebody tells Artie, Londongrad, as it's known, has become an offshore island for the new Russian underworld. Over his head, Artie is drawn further in, to Moscow, where, balancing between the old KGB and the new FSB, between the dazzle and grimness of Russia today, he uncovers a painful truth about his past that puts Tolya's life in the balance.
Review
“Nadelsons steady pacing keeps the pages turning... the detective-story format overlays an ambitious novel that manages to trace the tentacles of an international underworld of increasingly palpable influence, while at the same time forcing us to confront uncomfortable moral questions of loyalty and honor.”
—Harpers “Nadelson writes wonderfully well about New York in her crime novel series featuring detective Artie Cohen. Her new book, however, takes Cohen out of his comfort zone. The murder of a Russian friends daughter leads him to London and Moscow. Nadelsons take on a London of oligarchs fuelled by money from the ‘new Russia is thrilling and trenchant.”—Ian Rankin
“Reggie Nadelson is an original. Her detective Artie Cohen is as cunning as he is charming, as hardnosed as he is vulnerable, more gemütlich and giving than he likes to reveal. Her dialogue, characters and descriptive atmosphere are so authentic they assault the senses. This is crime fiction at its highest level.”—Open Letters Monthly
“Reggie Nadelson, where have you been all my life? This book is not just a well-written thriller, but one of those, ‘Damn, shes really good type of books, the kind that inspires reading junkies to immediately seek out the authors backlist to see what hes been missing. LONDONGRAD is a dark, moody, brooding gem thats bound to get under your skin.”—Mystery Scene magazine
“If your summer reading calls for something more in the murder mystery and thriller genre, you cant go wrong with Nadelsons latest installment in the Artie Cohen mystery series…a timely tale of crossed loyalties and international conspiracies that should serve many well as a guilty summer pleasure.”—Russian Life magazine
Review
"On a warm summer's day, cold is too depressing to think about -- which, Reggie Nadelson suggests in Londongrad (Walker & Company, $25), is what bad weather has in common with Russia, that vast, shambolic empire of thawing permafrost, radioactive sushi, and sleazy "businessmen" of the kind whose antics are at the center of Nadelson's latest Artie Cohen mystery. Cohen is a New York cop born in Moscow to a disaffected Jewish KGB agent, a background that gives Artie a permanent loathing of all things Russian. But he's still got a soft spot for the odd Russian, especially Tolya Sverdloff, who 'behaves like one of those dumb-ass oligarchs,' according to Sverdloff's sexy daughter, Valentina. 'He buys big-time art. You know the joke about the oligarch who says I just got a tie that cost four hundred bucks and the other oligarch says, I paid six hundred for the same thing. Daddy buys and buys and buys.'" Benjamin Moser, Harper's Magazine (Read the entire )
Synopsis
In a playground in Brooklyn, Artie Cohen is led to a dead girl tied up in duct tape on a children's swing. He soon realizes the killer murdered the wrong girl — the intended victim was his best friend Tolya, Sverdloff's daughter, who soon meets a similar fate. Artie Cohen — Russan-born New York police detective — is drawn inexorably from New York to London and ultimately to Moscow in pursuit of the killer. There, already in over his head, Artie uncovers a painful truth about his past that puts Tolya's life in the balance.
Synopsis
In a playground in Brooklyn, Artie Cohen is led to a dead girl
tied
up in duct tape on a children's swing. He soon realizes the killer
murdered the wrong girl—the intended victim was his best friend Tolya
Sverdloff's daughter, who soon meets a similar fate. Artie
Cohen—Russan-born New York police detective—is drawn inexorably from New
York to London and ultimately to Moscow in pursuit of the killer. There,
already in over his head, Artie uncovers a painful truth about his past
that puts Tolya's life in the balance.
About the Author
A journalist and documentary filmmaker, Reggie Nadelson is the author of seven previous Artie Cohen novels: Fresh Kills, Red Hook, Disturbed Earth, Red Hot Blues, Hot Poppies, Bloody London, and Sex Dolls. Comrade Rockstar, her biography of Dean Reed, the American emigre who became the biggest rock star in the Soviet Union, is under option to Tom Hanks. Born in Greenwich Village, Nadelson now lives in downtown Manhattan.