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In Special Assignments, Erast Fandorin, nineteenth-century Russia’s suavest sleuth, faces two formidable new foes: One steals outrageous sums of money, the other takes lives. “The Jack of Spades” is a civilized swindler who has conned thousands of rubles from Moscow’s residents–including Fandorin’s own boss, Prince Dolgorukoi. To catch him, Fandorin and his new assistant, timid young policeman Anisii Tulipov, must don almost as many disguises as the grifter does himself. “The Decorator” is a different case altogether: A savage serial killer who believes he “cleans” the women he mutilates and takes his orders from on high, he must be given Fandorin’s most serious attentions. Peopled by a rich cast of eccentric characters, and with plots that are as surprising as they are inventive, Special Assignments will delight Akunin’s many fans, while challenging the gentleman sleuth’s brilliant powers of detection. Praise from England: “Boris Akunin’s wit and invention are a source of constant wonder.” –Evening Standard “[Fandorin is] a debonair combo of Sherlock Holmes, D’Artagnan and most of the soulful heroes of Russian literature. . . . This pair of perfectly balanced stories permit the character of Fandorin to grow.” –The Sunday Telegraph “Agatha Christie meets James Bond: [Akunin’s] plots are intricate and tantalizing. . . . [These stories] are unputdownable and great fun.” –Sunday Express “The beguiling, super-brainy, sexy, unpredictable Fandorin is a creation like no other in crime fiction.” –The Times
In Special Assignments, Erast Fandorin, nineteenth-century Russia’s suavest sleuth, faces two formidable new foes: One steals outrageous sums of money, the other takes lives. “The Jack of Spades” is a civilized swindler who has conned thousands of rubles from Moscow’s residents–including Fandorin’s own boss, Prince Dolgorukoi. To catch him, Fandorin and his new assistant, timid young policeman Anisii Tulipov, must don almost as many disguises as the grifter does himself. “The Decorator” is a different case altogether: A savage serial killer who believes he “cleans” the women he mutilates and takes his orders from on high, he must be given Fandorin’s most serious attentions. Peopled by a rich cast of eccentric characters, and with plots that are as surprising as they are inventive, Special Assignments will delight Akunin’s many fans, while challenging the gentleman sleuth’s brilliant powers of detection. Praise from England: “Boris Akunin’s wit and invention are a source of constant wonder.” –Evening Standard “[Fandorin is] a debonair combo of Sherlock Holmes, D’Artagnan and most of the soulful heroes of Russian literature. . . . This pair of perfectly balanced stories permit the character of Fandorin to grow.” –The Sunday Telegraph “Agatha Christie meets James Bond: [Akunin’s] plots are intricate and tantalizing. . . . [These stories] are unputdownable and great fun.” –Sunday Express “The beguiling, super-brainy, sexy, unpredictable Fandorin is a creation like no other in crime fiction.” –The Times
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
Excerpts-
Chapter 1
Chapter 1
The Jack of Spades oversteps the mark NO ONE IN the whole wide world was more miserable than Anisii Tulipov. Well, perhaps someone somewhere in darkest Africa or Patagonia, but certainly not anywhere nearer than that. Judge for yourself. To begin with, that first name—Anisii. Have you ever seen a nobleman—a gentleman of the bedchamber, say, or at least the head of some official department—called Anisii? It simply reeks of icon lamps and priests’ offspring with their hair slicked with nettle oil. And that surname, from the word tulip! It was simply a joke. He had inherited the ill-starred family title from his great-grandfather. When Anisii’s forebear was studying in the seminary, the father rector had the bright idea of replacing the inharmonious surnames of the future servants of the church with names more pleasing to God. For the sake of simplicity and convenience, one year he named all the seminarians after church holidays, another year after fruits, and great-grandfather found himself in the year of the flowers: someone became Hyacinthov, someone Balzamov, and someone else Buttercupov. Great-grandfather never did graduate from the seminary, but he passed the idiotic surname on to his progeny. Well, at least he had been named after a tulip and not a dandelion. But never mind about the name! What about Anisii’s appearance! First of all, his ears, jutting out on both sides like the handles of a chamber pot. Tuck them in under your cap and they just turned rebellious, springing back so that they jutted out like some kind of props for your cap. They were just too rubbery and gristly. There had been a time when Anisii used to linger in front of the mirror, turning this way and that way, combing to both sides the long hair that he had grown specially in an attempt to conceal his lop ears—and it did seem to look a bit better, at least for a while. But when the pimples erupted all over his physiognomy—and that was more than two years ago now—Anisii had put the mirror away in the attic, because he simply couldn’t bear to look at his own repulsive features anymore. Anisii got up for work before it was even light—in wintertime you could say it was still night. He had a long way to go. The little house he had inherited from his father, a deacon, stood in the vegetable garden of the Pokrovsky Monastery, right beside the Spassky Gates. The route along Pustaya Street, across Taganskaya Square, past the ominous Khitrovka district, to his job in the Department of Gendarmes took Anisii a whole hour at a fast walk. And if, like today, there was a bit of a frost and the road was covered with black ice, it was a real ordeal—your tattered shoes and worn-out overcoat weren’t much help to you then. It fair set your teeth clattering, reminding you of better times, your carefree boyhood, and your dear mother, God rest her soul. The year before, when Anisii became a police agent, things had been much better. A salary of eighteen rubles, plus extra pay for overtime, and for night work, and occasionally they might even throw in some travel expenses. Sometimes it all added up to as much as thirty-five rubles a month. But the unfortunate Tulipov hadn’t been able to hold on to his fine, lucrative job. Lieutenant Colonel Sverchinsky himself had characterized him as a hopeless agent and in general a ditherer. First he’d been caught leaving his observation post. (He had to—how could he not slip back home for a moment when his sister Sonya hadn’t been fed since morning?) And then something even worse had happened: Anisii had let a dangerous female revolutionary escape. During the operation...
About the Author-
BORIS AKUNIN is the pen name of Grigory Chkhartishvili, who was born in the Republic of Georgia in 1956. A philologist, critic, essayist, and translator of Japanese, Akunin published his first detective stories in 1998 and has already become one of the most widely read authors in Russia. He is the author of eleven Erast Fandorin novels, including The Winter Queen, The Turkish Gambit, Murder on the Leviathan, The Death of Achilles, and Special Assignments available from Random House Trade Paperbacks; and Sister Pelagia and the White Bulldog and Sister Pelagia and the Black Monk, in the Sister Pelagia series. He lives in Moscow.
Reviews-
Starred review from December 3, 2007 In this thrilling collection of two novellas, Akunin (The Winter Queen ) pits Erast Fandorin, his brilliant Russian detective who serves as the deputy for special assignments to the governor-general of czarist Moscow, against two different but equally deadly foes. In the comical “The Jack of Spades,” Fandorin finds a Watsonian sidekick in Anisii Tulipov, a luckless and overeducated errand boy whose life changes when Fandorin takes him under his wing. The pair must face a cunning con man and thief, reminiscent of the great French antihero, Arsène Lupin. Things take a darker turn in “The Decorator,” when Fandorin fears that Jack the Ripper is continuing his slaughter of prostitutes, this time in 1889 Russia. Clever writing and tight plotting, coupled with a willingness to shock readers by sacrificing significant characters, continue to cement Akunin's reputation as one of the finest contemporary authors of classic crime fiction.
January 15, 2008 Fans of the Erast Fandorin mysteries (e.g., "The Winter Queen") here get two for the price of one. In "The Jack of Spades," a clever swindler uses multiple disguises (and a seductive accomplice) to fleece the rich, his latest victim being Prince Dolgorukoi, Fandorin's protector. While pursuing Jack, Fandorin manages to pick up an assistant in the awkward but worthy Tulipov; they finally get their man, but justice isn't served in the way one would expect. Even more intriguing is that the companion story, "The Decorator," offers a novel solution to Jack the Ripper's identity. A serial killer is oozing about Moscow, murdering women and then leaving their innards neatly arranged on the ground. It's to make them more beautiful, explains the assailant in chilling interpolated passages. Fandorin recognizes the work of the famed English killer and goes about proving that he (or she?) is actually a Russian now home from London. Multiple suspects abound, and the ending is a real surprise, though as always Fandorin's triumph is bittersweet. A good addition to most mystery collections, especially where historicals are popular, this book can stand alone but will be richer when read in the context of the entire series.Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal
Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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