A review by nigellicus
The Twelfth Department by William Ryan

5.0

Alexei Korolev, a policeman in Moscow, 1937, is once again drawn into a case where the murderer is less terrifying than the political snares the investigation has to navigate to find them. A scientific director is found shot, but his work was for the security services, meaning that it was both secret and of questionable ethics. It may not even have been particularly scientific, according to his replacement, who ends up stabbed a few days later. Korolev is on the case and then, because a quick and efficient answer is more desirable than an accurate one, he's off it. Then he's back on it again, ostensibly to get to the truth, but also as part of a deadly power struggle between competing security departments. To make matters considerably worse, Korolev's son, Yuri, is missing, and may be in the hands of the institute where unspeakable experiments were performed on men and boys. Korolev doesn't care about himself, he wants to save his son, and catching the killer is less important than finding a way to survive.

Another superb thriller set in Russia at the height of Stalin's Terror. Ordinary lives lived in the shadow of fear and paranoia, and the near impossibility of doing the right thing and getting away with it give this whodunnit a texture of suspense and humanity, and Korolev, the tough but dogged and good-hearted policeman is a hero who can never be out of danger.