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The Turkish Gambit (Erast Fandorin Mysteries) (Paperback)

by Boris Akunin (Author), Andrew Bromfield (Translator)
Key Phrases: titular counselor, The Turkish Gambit, Boris Akunin, Erast Petrovich (more...)

3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (30 customer reviews)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Russian author Boris Akunin clearly delights in literary experimentation. The Winter Queen, his first novel to win U.S. release, was a police procedural, introducing a young but brilliant detective named Erast Petrovich Fandorin, serving in 1876 Moscow. However, Murder on the Leviathan (actually the third entry in the Fandorin series, but published second in the States) was quite different--an homage to formulaic Golden Age whodunits, taking place on a luxurious steamship. Now comes The Turkish Gambit, which is more a combination of war novel and romance, rather than crime fiction, with the majority of its mysteries so transparent as to barely merit the label.

The action here takes place in 1877 and 1878, on the Balkan front of a military conflict pitting tsarist Russia against the Ottoman Empire. Into this realm of posturing commanders and the foreign journalists whose florid prose makes those officers look better (or worse) than they really are ride Fandorin, now with the diplomatic corps, and Varya Suvorova, a strong-willed 22-year-old telegraphist hoping to reunite on the battlefield with her "future fiancé," an army volunteer. But Varya's efforts are frustrated when her intended is accused of espionage. His release can only be won by identifying the real informant-cum-saboteur, in which task Varya is willing to cooperate with Fandorin, despite her dislike of the stuttering and apparently "cold, disagreeable" former policeman. Amid profuse digressions concerning Turkish politics, female suffrage, and the harem system ("without it many women would quite simply starve to death"), Varya--trailed by lustful correspondents--investigates a suspicious colonel in Bucharest, only to become party to a deadly duel. A pair of officers are subsequently murdered, a guilt-ridden soldier hangs himself, and a British plot against Russia is alleged.

Akunin (the pseudonym of Grigory Chkhartishvili) nimbly portrays the tumultuous atmosphere of 19th-century combat, complete with ear-splitting cannon blasts and hard-charging cossacks. His dialogue is frequently clever, and in Varya he has created a woman fully capable of steering yarns and stopping hearts. Yet The Turkish Gambit is so laden with expendable exchanges, trivial players, and hieings off to hither and yon, that the reader's interest may wane well short of this story's dramatic climax. --J. Kingston Pierce --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly
If chatty digressions on love and war tend to slow the third Erast Fandorin historical to appear in the U.S. (after 2004's Murder on the Leviathan), Russian author Akunin does a superb job of rendering the immediacy of battle in the 1877–1878 conflict between the Motherland and Turkey, and illuminating the politics behind czarist fantasies of recapturing Constantinople. At the Balkan front, the quiet, stuttering Fandorin befriends Varya Suvorova, a midwife turned telegraphist. Varya is bent on visiting her court-martialed fiancé, who's accused of being a spy. Fandorin and Varya are soon caught up in the fortunes of the Russian army, which a well-placed mole seems intent on betraying. Suspicions point to various Russian staff officers and to some glamorous foreign correspondents, including Seamus McLaughlin from London's Daily Post and Michel Paladin from the Revue Parisienne. Codes, courtesans and love letters all come into play, as well as murder and suicide in combat, in a plot more complex than some West Point battle plans. While the plethora of minor characters can be confusing, the quirky Fandorin and determined Varya stand out amid the turmoil of their surroundings.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

Paperback: 240 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks (April 18, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0812968786
ISBN-13: 978-0812968781
Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 4.9 x 0.6 inches
Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (30 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #220,691 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Inside This Book (learn more)

Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
titular counselor

Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
The Turkish Gambit, Boris Akunin, Erast Petrovich, Varvara Andreevna, Bashi Bazouks, Osman Pasha, Midhat Pasha, Erast Fandorin, Lavrenty Arkadievich, Mikhail Dmitrievich, Abdul Hamid, San Stefano, Lieutenant Colonel Kazanzaki, Mademoiselle Barbara, Count Zurov, Great Writer, Pyotr Yablokov, Daily Post, Abdul Aziz, Miss Suvorova, Nikolai Pavlovich, Prince Karl, Charles Paladin, Captain Perepyolkin, Minister of War

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Citations (learn more)

3 books cite this book:

Passports to Crime: Finest Mystery Stories from International Crime Writers by Janet Hutchings on page 33
The Deadly Bride and 21 of the Year's Finest Crime and Mystery Stories: Volume II (Year's Finest Crime & Mystery Stories) by Ed Gorman on page 13
Murder on the Leviathan: A Novel by Boris Akunin in Back Matter

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	15% buy The Winter Queen: A Novel (An Erast Fandorin Mystery) 3.9 out of 5 stars (81) $10.36
	7% buy Murder on the Leviathan: A Novel 4.0 out of 5 stars (31) $10.36
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Customer Reviews

30 Reviews

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Average Customer Review

3.9 out of 5 stars (30 customer reviews)

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27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Excellent Erast Fandorin Mystery, March 8, 2005

By	Leonard Fleisig "Len" (Washington, D.C.) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Turkish Gambit: A Novel (Erast Fandorin Mysteries) (Hardcover)

Boris Akunin's Erast Fandorin series has been spectacularly successful in Russia. Akunin's books have sold millions of copies there. Akunin, whose real name is Grigori Chkhartisvili, was born in (Soviet) Georgia. He grew up in Kazakhstan and then Moscow. Highly educated, Akunin was a student of linguistics, editor of a scholarly literary journal and a Japanese-Russian translator. He turned to writing these stories at age 40 during his self-described mid-life crisis. He saw a niche between the serious tomes that marked Russian literature (Tolstoy, Solzhenitsyn, etc.) and the mass market pulp fiction that dominated the low end of the post-Communist literary market. His book sales both in Russia and in Europe and the United States have proved him correct.

Turkish Gambit takes place in 1877. Russia is at war with Turkey after Russia and Serbia came to the aid of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Bulgaria in their struggle to free themselves from rule by the Ottoman Empire. The war had important implications for all of Europe. The war was concluded at the Congress of Berlin, a congress that pretty much stripped the Russians of the gains they had made in the war. The Congress of Berlin humiliated the Russians and paved the way for future unrest in the Balkans that eventually led to the First World War. Newspaper reporters and others (including assorted spies) flocked to the battlefront from all over Europe. This is the historical context in which we find Fandorin and the Turkish Gambit's cast of characters.

The story centers on a young lady, Vavara Surovova. Like many children of the Russian aristocracy she considered herself progressive, smoked, enjoyed the pleasures of the flesh, and had a great disdain for Tsarist rule. Nevertheless, she decides to travel from Moscow to meet up with her fianc�, a Russian officer serving in the corps of cryptographers. No sooner does her journey start than she encounters a life threatening situation. It is here that Fandorin makes his initial appearance. Although she has no small amount of disdain for the man who rescued her they make their way to the front, near the town of Plevna where the Russian army is laying siege to a Turkish stronghold. As the story progresses Vavara soon becomes the focal point not only of the romantic advances of the soldiers and reporters encamped near Plevna but also of the spies and counter-spies who are trying desperately to influence the course of the war. The intensity of the story and Akunin's writing builds as the siege reaches its conclusion. As was the case in both Winter Queen and Leviathan nothing is truly as it seems and the layers of mystery created by Akunin are peeled away slowly by Fandorin. Akunin does an excellent job in maintaining the mystery throughout, even for those very familiar with plot devices and red herrings in stories of this sort.

One of the more interesting aspects of this series of books has been the marked change in the style of each book. Winter Queen may be described as an action-adventure yarn with the young, optimistic and idealistic Fandorin racing from pillar to post, Indiana Jones-style, saving the world, or at least Moscow from some spectacularly murderous evil-doers. In Leviathan, we see a more subdued, thoughtful Fandorin playing the role of Hercule Poirot in an Agatha Christie parlor mystery. Fandorin was not center stage but would appear at critical moments to use deductive reasoning to advance the story and solve the mystery. In Turkish Gambit we see Fandorin in 19th-century spy mode reminiscent of Joseph Conrad's Secret Agent. Fandorin is more involved in the action than in Winter Queen but is placed a bit off-center as Vavara and her mishaps takes center stage.

Turkish Gambit should not disappoint any Akunin fan that has been awaiting the publication of his third story in English. The Turkish Gambit is a highly enjoyable period piece marked by good writing and better than average characterizations. Turkish Gambit is the third Erast Fandorin mystery series translated into English, following the publication here of Winter Queen and Leviathan. However, Turkish Gambit was the second in the series published in Russia. For those new to Akunin's Fandorin mysteries I suggest beginning with Winter Queen, followed by Turkish Gambit and then Leviathan.

So far there are a total of eleven Fandorin mysteries published in Russia. Akunin has also written another four books in which Fandorin's grandson is a detective in contemporary Moscow. I eagerly await the publications of these volumes. Turkish Gambit was a delight and I do not hesitate to recommend it to anyone interested in a good yarn.

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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Series with Great Potential, June 29, 2005

By	Marco Antonio Abarca (Colorado) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Turkish Gambit: A Novel (Erast Fandorin Mysteries) (Hardcover)

I purchased the Turkish Gambit because the novel takes place during the interesting but relatively unknown Russo Turkish War of 1877. The novel's backdrop is the memorable seige of Plevna, a bloody precursor to the trench warfare that Europe would experience during the Great War.

The hero of the novel is Erast Fandorin an agent of the Russian Secret Police charged with shutting down the network of a master Turkish spy. The novel's greatest strength is the rich atmosphere in which Boris Akunin places his story. With its haughty noblemen,dashing hussars and cosmospolitan foreign correspondents, I was reminded of Agatha Christie's Orient Express.

In my mind, The Turkish Gambit falls into the realm of the Victorian Adventure story. Like Harry Flashman or Sydney Riley, Erast Fandorin travels the Victorian world going from one adventure to the next. However, unlike Harry Flashman or a young Winston Churchill, Fandorin is never in the middle of the action. In this novel, he spends most of his time in camp searching for the Turkish spy. In temperment he is closer to Sherlock Holmes than Richard Burton. It may sound callow but I would have given this novel five stars, if Fandorin had been a more physical character. However, this is the first book in the series that I have read and I am impressed enough to purchase a second book.

For anyone else interested in the Russo Turkish War, I highly recommend Captain R.W. Von Herbert's, "The Defense of Plevna", a first hand account of the seige by an Englishman who served as a Turkish officer. It is out of print but can easily be found. This is a well written account in the same vein as Winston Churchill's early books.

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Erast Fandorin goes to war..., March 11, 2005

By	Alexander Gitlits (Moscow, Russia) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Turkish Gambit: A Novel (Erast Fandorin Mysteries) (Hardcover)

Turkish Gambit is the 3rd novel in the Erast Fandorin series published in English (after 'The Winter Queen' and 'Leviathan'), but actually it's the second in the series.
The book takes place during the Russian-Turkish war in the Balkans and follows the real events, mixing fact and fiction seamlessly.

There are several things which, I think, contributed to it being published after 'Leviathan'. First - the hero of the series, Fandorin, is not as much of a central figure here, as he is in previouse books. Second - this is more of a war story, then a detective story. There is a search for a spy in the Russian camp, but mostly is about men (and a woman) at war. As a result, the book does qualify as a mystery, but just barely. As was said before (by me, and other reviewers), each Fandorin novel is different in style, and explores another sub-genre of mystery literature. It helps the series remain fresh, but it also can put off some readers, who prefer their mysteries to be more standard in structure:
mysteriouse and/or horrible murder - detective takes the case - a pretty girl, related to the victim - some missing files/jewelery/artifact - a chase - some sex - a fight - girl is kidnapped - the villain revealed/girl saved (not saved if she is the villain) - the end.

Sadly, while this book is not formulatic, the marriage of detective fiction and war fiction here is not as exciting and easy-going as the other Fandorin tales. Still, even when this novel drags a bit, it isn't lacking in style.
The war of Russian Empire with the muslim Turkey gives Akunin a chance to speak some thoughts of the West-East conflict in general. These thoughts can be relevant to the current situation in the Middle East, but I have to point out, that in reality they are about Chechnya (the book was written in late 90s).

P.S. A movie version of 'Gambit' was released in Russia just two weeks before the 1st American edition of the book, and it was an immediate box-office success. If you like the book, you would probably like it, too.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars confusing, hard to follow...
My first Akunin book, so maybe that was the problem. I had trouble keeping the characters straight and often had trouble plowing through the prose. Maybe it's just not my style.

Published 4 months ago by "just one opinion"

4.0 out of 5 stars Tracking traitors and stalking subversives
She's young, beautiful - and abandoned. Varvara Suvanova, a "modern woman" in late 19th Century Russia, has been deserted by her "guide" in a remote Bulgarian inn. Read more

Published 14 months ago by Stephen A. Haines

5.0 out of 5 stars Who is tricking whom?
"Gambit", literally "tricking somebody" is usually applied to military operations or chess strategies. Read more

Published 14 months ago by Friederike Knabe

2.0 out of 5 stars So So
I was disappointed in this second book. The voice of Erast was what made the first book so enjoyable in this one he has been silenced in favor of a rather annoying shallow girl.

Published 18 months ago by Cynthia Colombo

5.0 out of 5 stars A mystery plus thriller rolled into one
Akunin is a great writer who tells historically-based tales that combine a mystery with the timing of a thriller. His books are a delight and this one is no exception.

Published 18 months ago by Barbara R. Barkovich

4.0 out of 5 stars Rollicking Story of Spies and Betrayal
Even though this is the third "Erast Fandorin Mystery" to be published in English translation, it was the second written by "Akunin". Read more

Published 22 months ago by Grey Wolffe

4.0 out of 5 stars Fresh, Sharp and Ironic
I found this on a remaindered table and was pleasantly surprised. The Turkish Gambit, somewhat stuffy in its presentation (in a nineteenth century sort of way), is in fact a... Read more

Published on July 9, 2007 by Stuart W. Mirsky

5.0 out of 5 stars Turetskiy gambit (DVD 2005)...Turkish Gambit
Turkish Gambit directed by Dzhanik Faiziyev is an vivid film protrayal of this wonderful Russian noevl. Read more

Published on May 6, 2007 by Joe Taxable

5.0 out of 5 stars Akunin's Usual Delicious Twists and Turns
'The Turkish Gambit' continues the career of erstwhile Russian police detective Erast Fandorin in this the third in Boris Akunin's distinctive mystery series (which is wildly... Read more

Published on May 4, 2007 by Douglas S. Wood

4.0 out of 5 stars Fandorin and the Russo-Turkish War
The Turkish Gambit is the third Fandorin story published in English, but chronologically it is the second tale following on from the events of the Winter Queen and proceeding the... Read more

Published on April 15, 2007 by dinadan26

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