The Gentle Axe

Written by: R N Morris

Read by: Simon Vance

Published by: Tantor

Price: $27.99

Also: MP3 CD available from Amazon £13.27

I must firstly mention the superb packaging of this unabridged audiobook. A robust (Unikeep) casing houses innovative pockets that are easy to handle on the move. Hooray!

This is a fabulously dark and descriptive story from the outset. It opens in December 1866, a year and a half after police investigator, Porfiry Petrovich solves the case of the deranged student Raskolnikov in Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment .

Simon Vance reads. His clear, warm voice delivers Russian words and phrases with a lucid ingenuity. Of course, most of the names went in one ear and out of the other, but because of Vance’s clarity I was able to identify them when the came up again.

Zoya Nikolaevna Petrova is an old prostitute with a good heart. She’s described as being as fat and as dark as a beetle. She is scouring Petrovsky Park in search of firewood when she finds a burly peasant hanging from a tree, a bloody axe tucked into his belt. Beside him is a suitcase, which Zoya opens to find the body of a dwarf with a deep gash in his head. Did the burly peasant kill the dwarf and then himself? Zoya certainly doesn’t dwell on this as she rifles trough the dead dwarf’s pockets and finds some pornographic playing cards and an envelope stuffed with money!

Lieutenant Salytov is next at the scene and the novel takes on a humorous tone as he and his lackey try and deduce what has happened. Salytov immediately settles on the theory that the burly peasant killed the dwarf and then himself. Porfiry Petrovich, on the other hand, reads more into it.

Porfiry is a vivid and well rounded character. His astute ‘Columbo-esque’ questioning and acute self-consciousness (he constantly blinks) make him likable. There’s also an obvious presence of empathy towards Zoya’s prodigy, Lily and her little girl, Vera.

The investigation is a complicated affair..(more so due to the fact that a lot has to be retained while listening – but hey, that’s what the rewind button is for.) In his investigation Porfiry takes us to a starving student’s lodgings, where he gives him some boots. We’re drawn through the dregs of Russian society, the brothels and pornographic publishers, but also involved are the higher echelons including a Prince. An unexpected twist brings both classes crashing together.

It’s a gripping tale, and although complicated, you’ll be riveted. Definitely one for a long journey.