Librarian Tim wrote: A former Russian soldier and survivor of the brutal war in Chechnya, Volk now works as a criminal and an undercover paramilitary operative. When he gets the chance to steal a painting of Leonardo da Vinci's from The Hermitage in St. Petersburg, he jumps at the opportunity, only to see it go spectacularly wrong in a hail of gunfire and double crossings. This hyper-violent thriller does a good job of setting the scene in post communist Russia, where gangs run wild and everybody is looking for a piece of the action. Where the narrative loses steam is in the unrepentant brutality of the characters. The body count and sadism involved in the killings sabotages the narrative, and takes the action from the level of a dark thriller to that of a twisted video game or cartoon. The character of Volk and the settings in Russia have tremendous potential, so hopefully Ghelfi will temper the violence with a more nuanced story in future books.
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