Snowden Nastiuk has gone to Russia after the time of the fall of Communism to bury himself, a loser in a loser nation in a world that wants only winners.Buried in a job working as a Document Controller in a Russian oil camp near Noyabrsk, Snow is – not happy, but at least content sitting out his life in a setting where he thinks he won’t have to feel any more pain. He has a job where he only has to interact with paper, not humans; a setting far from family and friends; and enough vodka to dull anything that threatens to get in past his defences.Until the woman walks into his life, literally. Magda Perskanski – physicist, gulag survivor, brothel madame, overseer of the Deficit Exchange Club, psychic capable of reading people’s pasts, mathabeautician – simply barges into his porta-cabin one day when Snow refuses to answer her knocking and kicks the legs out the crutches he’s come to depend on; she recognizes something deep inside the chuzhie that she knows is inside herself and refuses to let another human being suffer the same way as she has done.Little by little, Magda draws Snow out, first the story of what has caused him so much pain – the suicide of his mother when he was a young boy and the mindless death of his young girlfriend by a falling tree in the forest on a camping trip – then out of his torpor and the start of his first tentative steps back into the landmine-filled world of personal relationships. Not only is there Magda, there is Kolya, the unrepentant Communist who works with Snow in Document Control. And there is Pig –Porfiry Makahonic – the camp boss who rules everything in “his” oil camp with an iron fist, including his pet Doctor.There is also the mysterious sickness that keeps affecting and even killing the labourers in the oil camp’s pipeline/pigging system and laboratory, something which concerns Magda deeply, but which Snow doesn’t care about until Kolya ends up dead protecting the integrity of “his” documents against the crimes going on in camp.Crawling out of his vodka bottle long enough to go digging inside the day-to-day documents of the oil camp, Snow and Magda find evidence that Pig and the Doctor are hijacking radioactive cesium used in oil well-bore reading equipment and medical instruments and smuggling it out of the camp through the pig in the pipeline to terrorists who plan to use it in dirty bombs in Manhattan, Manchester and Mumbai. Before they can get the information to the authorities – no one is sure whom to trust in a still-reeling Russia run by the siloviki and absent rule of law – Snow is found half-frozen outside of his cabin on a cold winter’s night. Did somebody try and kill him or did he decide to follow his mother and ex-lover into death? In the end, Magda manages to bring Pig to justice and guide Snow back to a life he deserved all along. Views: 8
A killer is on the loose, blurring the line between fact and fiction. His prey — the writers of crime novels who have turned psychological profilers into the heroes of the nineties. But this killer shatters all conventional wisdom, and for one woman, the desperate hunt to uncover his identity becomes a matter of life and death. Professor Fiona Cameron is an academic psychologist who uses computer technology to help police forces track serial offenders. She used to help the Met, but when they screwed up an investigation after ignoring her advice she vowed never to work for them again. Still smarting from the experience, she’s working a case in Toledo when her lover, thriller writer Kit Martin, tells her a fellow crime novelist has been murdered. It’s not her case, but Fiona can’t help taking an interest. Which is just as well, because before too long the killer strikes again. And again. And Fiona finds herself caught in a race against time not only to save a life but to bring herself redemption, both personal and professional. Views: 8
Grieving the death of his ex-lover, Detective Inspector Tom Mariner has taken two weeks' leave to recuperate, seeking peace and solitude in a remote corner of Wales. The last thing he imagined was to find himself caught up in a murder investigation - with himself as the prime suspect. But when his walking holiday is interrupted by the discovery of a dead body, Tom discovers that there are a number of disturbing secrets being kept behind the closed doors of the ancient stone farmhouses that populate the region. Views: 8
Detective Inspector Tom Mariner investigates a suspected arson attack and a missing bridegroom in this latest intriguing mystery. When an elderly man dies in a house fire, the investigating officers are left baffled as to whether the blaze was accidental or started deliberately. If arson, was it a random attack - or part of a personal vendetta? It's not the first time the Shah family has been targeted. At the same time, DI Mariner is searching for a missing bridegroom who has vanished two weeks before his wedding. A case of cold feet? Or is there something more sinister behind his disappearance? Two seemingly unrelated investigations - but there is more to each case than meets the eye. And when a second body is found, events take a decidedly darker turn. Views: 8
Researcher Dr. Lily McAllister has dedicated her life to
finding a cure for a family disease and now, steps away from a promising new
treatment, Lily is attacked. Only the training of army physician James O’Reilly
can save her. As the would-be CEO of his family’s pharmaceutical company,
James’s secret dream is to reenlist. But he can’t leave Lily with a bull’s-eye
on her back. Nor can he stay and stop her from pursuing her goal. No one can,
including the stalker who shadows her every move. Still, James has lost too many
people he’s loved—and this time he refuses to lose Lily. Views: 8
