Untraceable
- Author Sergei Lebedev
- Narrator Saul Reichlin
- Publisher Blackstone Publishing
- Publish Date 30 March 2021
- Run Time 7 hours and 52 minutes
- Format Audio
- Genre Crime and mystery fiction, Espionage and spy thriller, Fiction: general and literary.
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What to expect
The terrifying, lengthening list of Russia’s use of lethal poisons against its critics has inspired acclaimed author Sergei Lebedev’s latest novel. With uncanny timing, he examines how and why Russia and the Soviet Union have developed horrendous neurotoxins.
At its center is a ruthless chemist named Professor Kalitin, obsessed with developing an absolutely deadly, undetectable, and untraceable poison for which there is no antidote. But Kalitin becomes consumed by guilt over countless deaths from his Faustian pact to create the ultimate venom. When the Soviet Union collapses, the chemist defects and is given a new identity in Western Europe.
After another Russian is murdered with Kalitin’s poison, his cover is blown, and he is drawn into an investigation of the death by Western agents. Two special-forces killers are sent to silence him―using his own undetectable poison.
In this fast-paced, genre-bending tale, Lebedev weaves suspenseful, stunningly beautiful prose exploring the historical trajectories of evil. From Nazi labs, Stalinist plots, and the Chechen Wars to present-day Russia, Lebedev probes the ethical responsibilities of scientists supplying modern tyrants and autocrats with ever newer instruments of retribution, destruction, and control.
Critics Review
“A thriller dipped in poison…[that] shares some of le Carré’s fascination with secret worlds and the nature of evil.”
“The absence of evidence makes accounts from the living, such as this courageous novel, all the more significant.”
“A taut spy thriller with Gothic flourishes…[and] insight into the psychological effects of poisoning, literal and metaphorical.”
“[A] le Carré-ish plot…Lebedev’s fiction excavates what lies beneath: the inner lives of earlier generations, buried under layers of official myth and self-deceit.”
“[An] excellent translation…There is an elegance, and urgency, to the narrative’s slow unfolding of secrets and memories. Untraceable invites us to look at what has been hidden in plain sight.”
“Intense…intelligent and stunning, Untraceable is a character-driven thriller about the price of control.”
“Probing the…horrors that science casually inflicts on people, animals, and the environment…A darkly absorbing intellectual thriller.”
“One of Russia’s most interesting young novelists takes on Putin, poison, and power in…a fascinating window on modern Russia.”
“Enthralling and exquisite, by one of modern Russia’s finest writers.”
“The darkest impulses of science and power cross paths with human error and plots gone awry in Sergei Lebedev’s incisive and all-too-plausible Russian novel.”
“Lebedev has perceived what was invisible to most Soviet and post-Soviet writers.”
“Spellbinding insight into a secret world that we forget at our peril, a world of assassins, spies, patriots, and poison masters whose shockingly evil decisions are made in their unwavering belief of serving a greater good.”
| Author | Sergei Lebedev |
|---|---|
| Narrator | Saul Reichlin |
| Duration | 7 hours and 52 minutes |
| Release Date | |
| ISBN | 9781665105538 |
| Format | Audiobook |
| Publisher | Blackstone Publishing |
| Genre | Crime and mystery fiction, Espionage and spy thriller, Fiction: general and literary |
| Availability | US |
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