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VOLK'S GAME
by Brent Ghelfi
Henry Holt, June 2007
320 pages
$19.95
ISBN: 0805082549


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Volk is an established figure in Moscow's underworld. His organization is involved in both prostitution and drug selling. He works for a psychotic mob lord, Maxim, and the General, a man who is never well described nor is his relationship to Volk ever explained. He sleeps with his partner, Valya, a young woman with a very bitter and painful past. While involved with Volk, she is also dating a woman but Volk does not know all of the details of this second relationship.

Volk is hired to steal a lost Leonardo da Vinci masterpiece. He gathers a group of men and Valya to lay the groundwork and steal the painting. Unfortunately, one of his partners betrays them and he barely escapes with his life. The painting is lost again. Volk begins looking for the missing man and the stolen painting but has little luck.

Then a mysterious man called Peter kidnaps Valya. Peter wants the painting found in under a week or Valya will be returned in pieces. Volk must find the double crosser, locate the missing picture and punish those who tried to kill him, before Valya is killed or worse.

VOLK'S GAME is a very dark thriller. All of the characters that appear in this book are criminals. They run the range from prostitutes to drug user to criminal mastermind. All of these characters are flawed, as their world is full of dangers and worse criminals than themselves. As well as being flawed, these characters have all had bitter and dangerous pasts that would destroy most people. For example, Volk spent some time in a prison camp where he was tortured and sodimized daily. His past haunts his present and influences his actions and his relationships with others.

In addition to character darkness, the darkness in VOLK'S GAME is reflected by the violence of this book. All of the characters are harmed and even tortured at one point or the other in this book. Volk deals with his fellow criminals by harming them or their families. Violence dominates the book as it dominates the plot, the characters' actions and the their relationships. If the violence – both implied and explicit – was removed from this book, the story could easily be told in fewer than 50 pages.

My biggest pet peeve with this book is that it does not have a cohesive plot – that is, it does not move smoothly and steadily. There is so much action and violence that there is little time devoted to plot development or descriptions. This lack of detail makes the story feel choppy and makes it difficult to care what happens to the characters or the painting. It also makes it difficult to determine why certain events happen and why characters act the way they do.

On occasion I do enjoy noir mysteries. Sometimes it is important to remember that there is evil in the world and that not everyone will receive a happy ending. VOLK'S GAME is certainly filled with immorality and none of the characters even have the chance of peace or happiness.

This hopelessness and despair is more than I can handle; I need the possibility of hope and redemption in order to enjoy a book. Things do not have to work out for the protagonist but there needs to be the chance that things will improve in the future. VOLK'S GAME does not leave much room for this possibility. Readers who enjoy noir or enjoy protagonists from the underworld or criminal class should enjoy this book. Readers who do not enjoy this type of book should probably avoid VOLK'S GAME.

Reviewed by Sarah Dudley, March 2007

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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