Customer Reviews

Child 44

5 star:		(197)
4 star:		(89)
3 star:		(29)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(17)

 

 

I generally don't care for serial killer stories, I find that everyday "regular" crime holds plenty of drama and is much easier to connect with. However, the Soviet setting of this debut thriller intrigued me enough to dip into it for a few pages, and the writing on those first few pages swept me into the story very quickly. For the first 3/4, it's an excellent grafting of the serial killer genre onto the everyday horror of the early-'50s Stalinist era Soviet Union. Unfortunately, Smith succumbs to the thriller writer's temptation of having a huge plot twist toward the end, which unnecessarily sabotages what had been a grim and realistic story to that point. It's one of those twists that comes out of nowhere, and really doesn't serve much purpose other than as a "gotcha" moment -- the story could have worked just as effectively without it.

Other than this one vastly annoying flaw, the book is excellent. After a chilling prologue in the famine-devastated Ukraine of the 1930s (a famine engineered by Stalin, it must be noted), the story opens in 1953 Moscow, where we meet Great Patriotic War hero and militia officer Leo Demidov, as he pursues the interests of the state in tracking down its enemies. Smith takes plenty of time to build up the totalitarian setting, where fear and paranoia reigned, and reason was a luxury unavailable to the state. If you were a suspect, you were guilty, since the state did not make mistakes. The story focuses on Demidov, showing the privileges his family enjoys due to his position, and the precariousness of his position as a jealous underling plots to destroy him. (This underling is the weakest element in the book, as his hatred for Demidov is a critical catalyst several times in the story, but the motivation for it is far too one-dimensional.)

It isn't until 1/3 of the way into the book that the serial killer plotline starts to assert itself, and Leo begins to realize that the same killer might have struck hundreds of miles apart. It's also at this point that I realized that Smith was taking the case of the real-life Soviet serial killer Andrei Chikatilo (aka "The Rostov Ripper") and moving it back in time a few decades. The killer's background, physical details, MO, and more are all based on the Chikatilo case. (I find it a little bit odd that while the "further reading" section at the end of the book makes a passing mention to a book on the Chikatilo case, Smith doesn't explain who Chikatilo was or just how directly he drew upon the case for the book. There have been several non-fiction books written about the case (such as Hunting the Devil), and two mediocre films based on it: Citizen X and Evilenko.) In any event, once Leo starts to suspect the existence of such a killer, he is severely hamstrung in his ability to do anything about it -- partly because the existence of such a madman is incompatible with the utopian ideals of the Soviet state. To admit such a killer would be to admit the imperfection of the state.

As Leo's star falls, he is also subject to a shock in his personal life which makes him question everything. Galvanized to find and kill the serial killer as an act of redemption, he manages to enlist some help even as he comes under further pressure from his nemesis. A classic trope of the thriller is that the hunter/truth-seeker becomes the hunted, and Smith pulls just such a maneuver off brilliantly. The book picks up momentum, and other than the unnecessary plot twist mentioned above, races toward the climactic showdown with great skill. It's an excellent debut novel, and should have wide appeal to fans of thrillers, the serial killer subgenre, and fans of Martin Cruz Smith.

Warning: Some spoilers in the review below.

Long a fan of "Citizen X" the HBO film about Russian serial killer Andrei Chikatilo, who killed children at large in the Soviet Union from 1978-1990, I'd heard some buzz about "Child 44", but didn't read any reviews until I purchased the book.

The young British author, Tom Rob Smith, made my jaw drop with his version of historical fiction, because yes, Smith takes the tale of Andrei Chikatilo (who has been written about in true crime genre) and moves it BACK in time, keeping the tale somewhat intact but setting it in Stalinist Russia in the early 50's. The contrast is startling, because, by the 80's, near the end of the Cold War, the denizens of the USSR had been disillusioned by the "glory" of Communism and had spent decades poor, hungry, frightened of the state. Despite that, the hunt for Chikatilo in the 80's was funded and followed, somewhat as an afterthought, by the state.

In the 50's, with Stalin's grip on the nation--it's a worker's paradise in everything but reality. And the leader would never allow such crimes as murder to exist. And with this change of landscape, the author, with what must have been painstaking research of the times, heightens the suspense, creates a sense of absolute hopelessness, and puts the military hero tracking the killer in fear for his own life and those of his family.

Pursuing the killer, and refusing to denounce his own wife, Leo Demidov places his own career and life in jeopardy. In addition to the deft way in which the author moves from Leo's childhood to his present, from the killer to Demidov and back, and into the stark conflict that is Leo's life with his wife, Raisa, Smith doesn't give up his terse, descriptive style; of the forbidding Lubyanka, he writes:



"Its façade created the impression of watchfulness: rows and rows of windows crammed together, stacked up and up, rising to a clock at the top which stared out over the city as though it were a single beady eye. An invisible borderline existed around the building. Passersby steered clear of this imaginary perimeter as if fearful they were going to be pulled in. Crossing that line meant you were either staff or condemned. There was no chance you could be found innocent inside these walls. It was an assembly line of guilt".


Brilliantly conceived, and flawlessly executed, "Child 44" is the best book I've read so far this year.

Please read other reviews for a synopsis of the story. The first third of Child 44 is an extremely engaging read that graphically depicts the psychological torment of life in late Stalinist Russia. Mistrust is the common currency of virtually any social interaction including the intimacies of family and friends. Whether Tom Rob Smith's descriptive powers are more the result of an extremely fertile imagination or thorough research, this reader was quickly drawn into that frightening totalitarian world so grimly portrayed. The novel unfortunately becomes increasingly concerned with the suddenly enlightened and obsessed hero's quest to win over his estranged wife while finding the serial killer who is the author of countless murders of young children. The implausiblity of the story and of much of the action increases exponentially as Leo's search heads towards its climax. What had initially kept me up past my bedtime with excitement and anticipation became, if not a chore, an obligation worth seeing through to its less than satisfactory end.

Having never written a review of any sort, I could not help but express my thanks to the author for this reality check describing Stalin's Russia. The atrocities of the serial killer and those experienced by the Russian general population are the same in their brutality and insanity. This is a serial killer story straight from the pages of Animal Farm. If you are a grandparent give this book to your children. They will appreciate a good fiction story and gain a better picture of what happens in a totalitarian state. Later they can share this book with your grandchildren.

Mr Smith uses as his backdrop the Stalinist Soviet Union of the 1950s, combines elements of the real case of Andrei Chikatilo, and delivers an engrossing and impressive debut novel.

Leo Demidov, a decorated war hero, is unswervingly loyal to the State. The body of a young boy is found on train tracks in Moscow, and his family are convinced the child was murdered. Leo's superiors order him to ignore this information and, while he obeys, he senses there is more to the case.

Action moves quickly: combining elements of jealousy, suspicious paranoia and human survival where reality is defined and enforced by the State. In this atmosphere, Leo is disgraced and exiled to a distant town where more murdered children are discovered.

There are a number of layers to this story. While some aspects are predictable, it is the way in which Mr Smith combines the pieces which make this such an absorbing read. Who is the murderer, and how many children have been murdered? Will Leo, his wife Raisa, and their marriage survive? Along the way, this novel touches on both the best and the worst of humanity.

`To stand up for someone was to stitch your fate into the lining of theirs.'

I highly recommend this novel, and I look forward to reading more from Mr Smith.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

If it weren't for the Soviet Union and the blood lust of the Russian communists, I would not exist. My parents were World War II refugees, on the run for their lives from Soviet-occupied Latvia. They arrived in the United States at about the same time, immigrants with nothing but what they wore on their backs, with the most skeletal English language skills. Had they not spotted each other across the room of immigrants and felt drawn one to the other, well, that would have been an entirely different story, and without me in it.

Even so, you won't hear gratitude from me. My existence does not by any measure outweigh the brutalities of Soviet power. A large percentage of the Latvian population was deported, tortured and executed under the communist regime. My life cannot measure up to such suffering of the multitudes. In later years, I traveled several times to the Soviet Union to see for myself this world that had so often been described to me, yet nonetheless remained and remains nearly incomprehensible. The experience of my travels behind the Iron Curtain is a memory that will never leave me. These are the memories and impressions returned to me with the reading of Tom Rob Smith's debut novel, Child 44.

Tom Rob Smith has taken his premise for Child 44 from the true story of Russian serial murderer, Andrei Chikatilo, who murdered over 50 women and children in Russia during the 1980s. Although Smith has set his story in an earlier time period, the 1950s, he has not lost, but only gained levels of intrigue and suspense by choosing the worst years of Soviet oppression. The difference, the author explains, is that in the latter years, someone in open rebellion against the political system might lose an apartment, while in earlier years, it would have meant the loss of life.

The story of Child 44 has the chill of historical and political accuracy. The author is still in his twenties at this writing, yet the combination of his research and already rich life and travel experience have given him the depth of insight required to bring this tale of Soviet horror vividly to life. I had to wonder, in fact, and quite often during my reading, how many readers less aware of Soviet history might construe this as mere fantasy. In too many ways, it is not. The sense of unraveling sanity and logic threaded throughout daily Soviet life is all too real: Black is declared white and white, black. What you see, you are told, is not what you see. What you know is not to be known. Deny everything. And in saving your own life, choose who will die among your loved ones.

Leo Demidov is a key character, the communist detective pursuing the killer who cannot be named. The first insanity is that the Soviet government denies the existence of crime in its so-called utopian state. If life is perfection, why would anyone commit a crime? Crime, they claim, is an outgrowth of a capitalist society. And then, a crime so gruesome as to kill a child, ripping open his belly to expose his insides, stuffing his open mouth with bark and gravel. Yet such dead and tortured children's bodies appear throughout Soviet Russia, and despite the growing threat to his own safety, Demidov is determined to stop the child murderer. He cannot question witnesses, however, when there is no official crime to witness. He cannot conduct investigations when there is no official crime to investigate. To stop these murders, Demidov must become himself a criminal against the state. Such is Stalin's workers' paradise ...

The stakes grow ever higher, as Demidov's loyalty to the state is tested when his wife is accused of being a spy. In spite of her innocence, Demidov is faced with calling the authorities liars by defending his wife--or handing over his innocent wife to be executed but show his loyalty to the state that does no wrong.

A page-turner, indeed, but blood runs even colder when one knows this type of existence was all too real behind the Iron Curtain of the very real Soviet Union. Tom Rob Smith has my respect and admiration for putting into words what makes so little sense to the rational mind. I suggest supplemental reading in the form of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago for the true history of this nightmarish world.

~Zinta Aistars for The Smoking Poet, Summer 2008 Issue

There are really two books here, one is a police procedural and the other is a love story. One works, one doesn't. As a debut writer, Smith falls into too many cliches when it comes to his love story, and more than anything else it gets in the way of the murder mystery. The first half of the book which deals with living in Stalin's post WW2 tyranny is very well done and very authentic (except for the map on the end flaps). The problem arises when Smith tries to work in a love story among the murders.

The story of Raisa and Leo is too forced and too pat to be interesting and doesn't add anything to the story but length. The bad guy, Vasili could have been taken from a stock Warner Brothers WW2 Gestapo agent. He does everything but sneer and twirl his mustache. The connection between the murderer and the cop is way too coincidental and again adds nothing to the story but triteness. A good editor could have made this a great book by getting rid of the saccharine scenes of the Russian Peasants and stayed on message of chasing the bad guy.

Leo Stepanivich Demidov, a war hero and member of the MGB, working as a high ranking employee of the State Security force, started off with one ambition: to serve his country. His job was frequently unpleasant, arresting and interrogating enemies, sometimes their own citizens who tried to undermine the government. Leo was involved with many successful arrests and took many prisoners, many of these prisoners guilty of anti-Soviet agitation, counterrevolutionary activity, and espionage. The problem was, no on could be sure they weren't guilty of these crimes, anybody from a retired vet to a top-ranking Party official could be under constant threat of arrest for attempting to overthrow, subvert, or weaken the Soviet Power.

When Leo finds himself in danger of arrest himself, the story starts to twist, and together Leo and his wife struggle against the very system that he once obediently and willingly served.

Leo and his wife are obsessed with solving a string of murders and this gruesome case soon becomes a cause they are both willing to die for. "Isn't this the way it starts? You have a cause you believe in, a cause worth dying for. Soon, it's a cause worth killing for. Soon, it's a cause worth killing innocent people for" PG 393. In trying to find justice, they were quickly forced to imitate the very system they were up against.

Child 44 was a thrilling mystery, love story, and horror story all in one. Even though parts of it were sickeningly gruesome, I found it hard to put it down. I have already recommended this book to many friends, and look forward to subsequent novels from this author.

The first 3/4 of this novel is a remarkable achievement. The prologue is harrowing, the dialogue razor sharp and the story and characters complex and fascinating. But perhaps the greatest strength of the novel is its setting (The Soviet Union in the early 1950's) and the premise that a serial killer could murder dozens, perhaps hundreds of children, and go undetected because of the State's unwillingness to admit that murder happens in their `utopian' state. Murders are blamed on vagrants and Western spies or are claimed to be accidents or otherwise covered up. The notion that a party member could commit such atrocities is contrary to the propaganda machine of the totalitarian regime. The majority of the novel is suitably bleak and cruel and suffocating as the state clamps down on its people and thwarts any attempt to solve these crimes. (Sounds dreary I know - but trust me, it's riviting).

Unfortunately I didn't care for the ending. There is the contrived plot twist that was completely unnecessary, but totally predictable - but I could live with that. And then the common folk rally behind our heroes, at great risk to their communities, to help in ways that seemed a little too 'warm and fuzzy' to me - but I could live with that too.

What I really struggled with was the aftermath. I don't want to ruin the ending for anyone, but suffice it to say that many things get resolved in a completely improbable, sentimental way that is completely out of sync with the realistic, dark tone of the rest of the novel.

I know I am probably in the minority here but I would have liked an ending that evoked Orwell's 1984. I suppose most people like a happy ending and I can't help but feel that Smith compromised in order to pander to them. To me, the aftermath sabotaged the novel. It just didn't fit with the tone of the novel.

The dilemma: How do you rate a novel that captivates you so fully, only to frustrate you in the end? To put this in context, the first part of Child 44 isn't just good. It's `Mystic River' good. It's `Silence of the Lambs' good. This could have been one of the best novels ever written.

In the end, I settled on 4 stars. The majority of this novel is too good to be ranked any lower and the ending (the last sentence of the novel is so sappy it makes me cringe to think about it) is so frustrating I can't bring myself to award it 5 stars. Regardless of my whining, this is still a great novel, well worth reading. (Of course, if you like a tidy, happy ending, you'll love the aftermath and feel all `warm and glowy' while you read the final page).

Am I the only one who didn't like the ending? In the comment section I have provided a synopsis of the ending I would have liked to have seen (don't read the comments if you haven't read the novel yet)

This non-stop train-ride of a crime thriller will seize your attention from the first twenty emotionally wrenching pages and keep you hanging on for dear life for the remaining four hundred pages. Set in Moscow in 1953, when Communism controlled every aspect of daily life, and government officials believed that "there is no crime," the novel recreates the turmoil in the life of a State Security Force official who begins, reluctantly, to question the "facts" before him. Leo Stepanovich Demidov, working for MGB (Internal Security), is drawn into an investigation of the death of a four-year-old, supposedly struck and killed by a train. The child's family believes he was murdered, but Leo conveys a not-so-subtle warning to them not to question the state's findings regarding the child's death.

Because each community certifies its own causes of death, Leo can only regard the death of this child as a single instance of a mysterious death. When he is relocated to a more remote village and discovers that there has been a similar death there, however, he begins surreptitiously to investigate. Always, he must hide his reasons for asking for information. He cannot afford to be labeled as a doubter--he has a wife and parents to protect. Soon he has created a map showing dozens of similar crimes.

As Leo is trying to identify a serial killer, he must also deal with internal politics within the security service, including his own demotion and loss of reputation. A fellow MGB officer will stop at nothing to bring him down. At the same time, however, Leo is still a party man, and he plays by the book in his other investigations, including the interrogation, beating, and eventual execution of two men he knows to be innocent victims of the system. Torture, the use of informants, constant spying on each other, and the manipulation of records, are public policy--"Terror protects the Revolution," the party believes.

Author Tom Rob Smith's accomplished debut novel is filled with carefully drawn and vivid characters, all of whom convey their complex personalities within the structure of their communist society. His creation of Moscow life feels realistic, and his inclusion of maxims which could be part of a communist handbook adds to the sense of realism--and horror. Comparisons with Martin Cruz Smith (one of my favorite mystery writers) are inevitable, and this novel is at least as good as the best of Cruz Smith. In some ways--notably his ability to recreate the emotional milieu of the communist society--he may be even more successful. Outstanding! n Mary Whipple

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