Kolymsky Heights

Product Information

Exceptional offbeat minimalist thriller, with an unlikely hero -- a "Native Canadian" linguistic anthropologist! (Actually, I think the proper term is "First Nations".) There is also a quasi-science fantasy element that won't fool anyone with any understanding of modern science, even those inclined to think that the Russians always have something up their sleeves. The book is about a quest, much like Frodo and his journey to dispose of the ring. The problem I had with the hero Johnny Porter was he did not have the flaws Frodo had. He was basically good at everything from languages, building cars, fighting and just to perfect. Moonage Pictures, the UK production company set up by a handful of Peaky Blinders execs, is adapting Lionel Davidson’s Russian spy thriller Kolymsky Heights.

Kolymsky Heights | Crime Fiction Lover Kolymsky Heights | Crime Fiction Lover

Finally at long last a thriller which reflects the presumably rather mundane life of secret agents as they travel to all manner of far away locations with a meticulous logging of all the steps this takes. This does make the book rather plodding in parts but it's a mesmerizing plod, a plod which one rather enjoys and it unfolds with stately grace seldom encountered in a thriller. Porter, however, is descended from Canadian Inuits, who remain – physically, ethnically and culturally – virtually identical to their Siberian counterparts, despite the decades-long political rift between the two. That, alongside his linguistic skills – he also has to pass himself off as a Korean at one point – makes him the only spy able to get anywhere near the base without arousing suspicion. Ok, hold up-it really does pain me to write this review. I don’t like to trash any author on GR or anywhere else. I am not a writer myself; I have tried and spinning a good yarn is no easy task. Like I said, I was excited for this book, and after the prologue, I was even more excited. So what happened? Per alguna raó que desconec, aquesta novel·la no em permetia abandonar-la, però m'anava desesperant a poc a poc. It may have been because my mood wouldn't let me get into it but it also just wasn't a great story. Basically, this is the premise as I understood it. A Russian scientist sends a message to an acquaintance in the UK, a scientist he met many years ago at a conference in England. He has something that he needs to get out of Russia. He wants a third acquaintance to come and get it. This third acquaintance is a Canadian native, who also attended the conference.Well, I saw 'Kolymsky Heights' on a list of the best 25 thrillers of the past few years, read a couple blurbs by other authors about it (Charles Cumming, what have you done???) and thought I'd be in for a superior reading experience. Not! Note to self: don't rely on author's blurbs about other authors! I am a bit bemused why Philip Pulman waxes lyrically over this novel. It will s a good story if wildly far fetched. I see the author has won the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger Award three times so I plan to read his earlier novels. Forgotten the title or the author of a book? Our BookSleuth is specially designed for you. Visit BookSleuth An outrageously good book ... Possibly better than any other thriller written over the last 25 years. ( Daily Mail) As significant as … le Carré in bringing a gritty new realism to the thriller.’ ( Sunday Telegraph)

Kolymsky Heights by Lionel Davidson | Waterstones

The other important character of the story is not a human, it’s the deep frozen lightless Siberian winter. Kolymsky Heights is one of the best novels I’ve ever read in terms of capturing and using the sense of place to the advantage of the story. Finally, I should also mention the pacing of Kolymsky Heights. It is almost a master class in building and releasing tension, each time building the tension slightly higher until the last part of the novel when all that built up tension unleashes itself in a frenetic chase across Siberia. The characterisation is also generally good within the conventions of the thriller with the exception of the hero who seems to be a sort of cut-out sentimental sociopath of enormous animal cunning but without much of an interior life as far as we are concerned. Davidson’s prose is very readable (the many typos notwithstanding!), although maybe a little over-involved with some of the many technicalities involved in the caper.I've never read a thriller that so successfully transported me to a hitherto unimagined place. (Maxton Walker Guardian) This has been the biggest literary disappointment I’ve had in a while, because I was genuinely expecting to like this. This is my first book by Davidson; I always try to give an author a second chance if I don’t enjoy a book of theirs, and since I already (perhaps stupidly) grabbed Rose of Tibet when I bought this, I will be reading that at some point to see if Davidson can somewhat redeem himself for me. Not that he would care, and if you enjoyed this book, neither should you. MY beef instead is with the nature of the secret. And frankly, it could have been ANYTHING. pretty much anything. The secret is entirely, as far as I can see, irrelevant to the story. But it still is part of the story, and it's this: that they've bred talking chimpanzees. Ya wot, mate. Plot - ridiculous, but there is a dread and a horror alluded to early on which I was disappointed was not pursued as a significant plot reveal through the middle part of the book. However, the final phase of the book - Porter’s escape (successful or unsuccessful, I’m not saying) - is some of the most thrilling action I’ve read in a long time! So if this book had been "oh I'm kinda sci-fi-y" from the start, then I'd have been a bit more accepting of the talking apes. But when they arrived, my reading brain just threw all its toys out of the pram, went and had a bit of a break, and left whatever remained to finish the book. It's a fine book. I just wasn't happy to suspend my disbelief as far as was required. I can believe a guy builds a car by himself in a freezing cave. I can believe everyone falls madly in love with him for no discernably good reason. Those are all acceptable things within the spy-story framework. Talking chimpanzees are not.