One More Page Mystery Book Group

On the third Tuesday of every month, we mystery-lovers meet at One More Page Books at 7:00 to discuss a book. We have had as many as 23 participants and as few as ten, but whatever our number, we are passionate and opinionated about mysteries.

For December, we read Martin Cruz Smith’s GORKY PARK, a mystery set mostly in Russia that has much in common with all the great Russian novels. GORKY PARK shows Russian Soviet society in addition to a gruesome murder of ice skaters in the park. All this means that there are many characters as well as subplots, a challenge for many readers. Yet this book made for a long and deep discussion of the Soviet system and how an admirable investigator like Arkady Renko navigates the bureaucracy, the KGB, even foreign intervention to solve this murder.

My personal favorite subplot had to do with the American John Osborne’s back story during WWII, which had won him admiration and a medal for bravery from Stalin.

All book club members present, except perhaps one, agreed this was a satisfying read with strong writing and memorable characters. In the coming months we will read some of the best-written mystery and intrigue writers writing and publishing today. For January Allen Furst’s THE SPIES OF WARSAW is on tap, and in February we turn to the Dublin Murder Squad with Tana French’s IN THE WOODS, a genre-busting mystery. If these interest you, come join us.