“The Gentle Axe” by R. N. Morris (Penguin,
9780143113263, $14.95)
Set in 1860s Russia, this wonderfully entertaining historical crime novel
opens with perfect panache: an aging former prostitute trudges through the
snow in St. Petersburg’s Petrovsky Park gathering wood for her evening fire;
each step is an effort, each bend and rise a small agony until an errant
glance shows her a horror unimagined: before her, suspended from a tree,
hangs a dead man with a bloody axe dangling from his belt. And a few feet
away there lies the body of a dwarf, his head split open, and beside him is
a box overflowing with rubles. Voila, the mystery is afoot.
To investigate this remarkable crime, British novelist R. N. Morris borrows
police magistrate Porfiry Petrovich, who first appeared as a minor character
in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s classic novel “Crime and Punishment.” With his shrewd
demeanor and eccentric twitches, Porfiry Petrovich takes the case in hand
and begins to tease out the psychological quirks of his cagey witnesses and
suspects, despite a constant butting of heads with his colleagues. (One of
whom kindly explains to him, “This is Russia. We are governed, not by logic,
but by authority.”) Morris reveals the inspector’s own character only slowly
and through the eyes of others, and that unveiling is an incredible treat:
are his emotions really so subordinate to his reason, or is his quick acuity
perhaps a too-eager defense against the human corruptions of his work?
“The Gentle Axe” traipses through brothels and slums, pawnbrokers and
Petersburg squares with splendidly jovial Russian moroseness. Morris’s tone
is clever, empathetic, and darkly joking, and he demonstrates a keen ability
to evoke enchantment even from streets and sewers:
“The strongest aromas came as he passed the bakeries, the spice and incense
sellers, the tea and tobacco traders. Then he felt the fainter but no less
enticing breaths of the honey stalls and the chandlers. The fermenting
complexity of the preserved fruit merchants tempted him to linger, while the
dusty cough and pungent smack of the chalk and pitch dealers, their shops
decorated outside with balalaikas, hurried him on.”
Enthusiasts of literary mysteries, armchair time travel, and curious
characters replete with foibles and funks will relish this quick-paced novel
and the elegant protagonist at its center. Enjoy this first Porfiry
Petrovich mystery now, and be sure to reserve a copy of its excellent
follow-up, “A Vengeful Longing,” due out in early June. These stories are
full meals to a hungry reader, nourishing as well as entertaining; they are
bread and vodka, both.
Review by
Mark David Bradshaw, April 3, 2008
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