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Kurkov must be nailed on for a Nobel Prize although it probably won’t be for this book. It’s still good – what’s not to like about a volume where newly liberated citizens of Eastern Europe regularly pop into McDonald’s? As ever, he captures the bling absurdity of various territories but also historical antecedents and I love his sense of geography and ability to update the picaresque for our times. The book emphasizes the lawlessness and new power structures of Ukraine and Russia, albeit before
A fast and funny read into how corruption in Russia and Ukraine are so intimately linked. The story follows a Ukrainian police inspector investigating the murder of a general, and subsequently some other folks connected to him, and a KGB officer from the far eastern provinces who has no idea what he's being tasked to do or why. Both have mysterious handlers who call them with instructions, both have family lives they want to get back to, both are wholly confused until the end when they are exasp...
http://www.mytwostotinki.com/?p=1159"Kiev, night of 20th-21st May, 1997 Sergeant Voronko of the State Vehicle Inspectorate loved his snug little glass booth on Independence Square in the heart of Kiev, and never more than in the small hours, when Khreshchatik Street was free of traffic, and nipping out for a smoke was to experience a vibrant, blanketing silence very different from the fragile night stillness of his home village."But on that particular late evening, things turn out to be very dif...
This is a very similar story to ‘Death and the Penguin’ but without most of the charm. It’s still enjoyable, if confusing, but didn’t really deliver on what could’ve been a more interesting story about the dead general and his missing thumb. If you’re tossing up between the two books, go with Penguin.
I don't mind Kurkov but, as other reviewers have noted, this is difficult to follow. On the plus side there's a tortoise, but on the negative the tortoise doesn't get any memorable (or indeed any) lines.
Just really not my kind of book, there was a personality clash here but I made myself read it as it was a book club pick and I wanted to engage in the discussion. But this made me resent the book I think leading to a very punishing 1 star review I don’t think it really deserves.
Very complicated, and not at all plausible or interesting.
It took me a while to warm up to The Case Of The General's Thumb: At first, it struck me as being an earlier effort than Andrey Kurkov's two penguin novels -- Death and the Penguin and Penguin Lost -- but it looks as if it were written between the two. In The Case of the General's Thumb, there is no Mischa the Penguin, but there is a tortoise named Nina. It must be said, however, that Nina has not a hundredth the character of Mischa.Kurkov was born in Leningrad and writes in Russian, but he appe...
Perhaps I'm not used to his style of writing, but I found it very disturbing to the flow of the narrative. That and the constant switching between the two main characters and their different situations made it really tough to really absorb what was going on, leaving me confused more often than not. There were a few good moments, and from what I've gathered from other reviews it seems this may have been Kurkov's least impressive work, so I'll hold judgement on him till I read "Death and a Penguin...
One guy is a cop trying to follow leads, another is a guy looking for a flat. Through a series of incomprehensible phone calls, obscure orders and secret agent type travel arrangements we follow them both. There are many corpses, many more bottles of vodka, a hearse and an adopted tortoise. They are looking for a thumb and some money, Good luck! Same Russia, different shtick. "It was all money, money, money today. Ideology was out." I have a feeling it would have been much funnier if I was Ukrai...
From the same Ukrainian writer who brought you Death and the Penguin and A Matter оf Death аnd Life, both of which I liked a lot. This one is more of a spy novel with the prize being KGB gold, but it comes with the usual concise prose, quirky characters and Ukrainian politics Kurkov puts in his other novels. That said, this one’s not quite as good as the other two, but still pretty enjoyable.
An enjoyable but not incredible read. I recommend this novel be gulped not sipped - like a shot of vodka or a 200ml Kölsch. An quirky noir story from Ukraine. The first few chapters left me pretty mixed up, to be honest. It was easier to track the further the story progressed. Calling this novel a meeting of Bulgakov and LeCarre is overstating the case. But its heroes have merits and a subtle, dark humor.
Not my favourite Kurkov. May try it again someday.
