Red Ink

by Greg Dinallo

When onetime dissident journalist Nikolai Katkov is tipped off to the murder of a highly placed government official, he doesn’t count on the trail twisting into the lurid world of Moscow mafia casino-owner Arkady Barkhin. After Katkov’s relentless digging almost gets him gunned down, he receives an unexpected appeal for help from the striking Gabby Scotto, a US Treasury special agent. She has been tracking laundered money flowing out of the US—an investigation that has led to Barkhin’s casino and a similar dead end. But then Katkov obtains a sensitive government document that could shatter Russia’s fragile and newly free economy—and join Scotto in Washington to pick up the trail. Katkov’s tenaciousness in pursuit of a story has been honed by decades of KGB harassment, and his survival instincts—notwithstanding a penchant for vodka and American cigarettes—by a few hard years in the Gulag. He senses a kindred spirit in the vivacious Broolynite whose bravado is matched by her investigative savvy—and who leaps at the chance to lead some down-and-dirty field work. Scotto has doubts about sharing privileged information with a journalist, but they are squelched when Katkov makes a critical discovery about a shipping container heading south on I-95—one that they suspect is filled with $2 billion badly in need of laundering. As Katkov and Scotto’s pursuit races from freeways to freight cars, from Baltimore to Miami, they are shadowed by American entrepreneur Michael Rubineau, a man intent upon seeing the container safely to its ultimate destination. A frequent VIP guest at Arkady Barkhin’s Moscow nightclub, Rubineau has devised a scheme of stunning brilliance and unprecedented greed and venality. But as Scotto prepares to take him down, and Katkov composes his front-page headlines, they’re forced into a gambit of extreme peril. Heading into the last outpost of communism, Katkov is about to discover that love of country and lust for money can crumble even the fiercest loyalties . . .

Genres: Fiction

435 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 1, 1994

Reviews

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

FAIR THRILLER, WEAK ENDING

[Vanessa · Rating 3 out of 5]

'Um homicídio numa noite numa noite invernosa em Moscovo. Para jornalista NicolaI Katkob pode ser o artigo da sua vida, para o inspector da polícia Valerie Shevchenko podia ser o salto para a promoção ha tanto tempo esperada, e para Gabriella Scotto, agente especial do departamento de finanças dos Estados Unidos da América, o crime brutal podia ser a chave para denunciar um esquema de branqueamento de dinheiro a nível mundial. Trabalhando em conjunto, Katkov e Scotto seguem uma pista de dinheiro sujo e homicídio premeditado da Rússia aos Estados Unidos e novamente de volta à Rússia. Uma viagem interessante pelo que resta da antiga União Soviética, sem cortina de ferro para se esconder atrás.'

[C.A. Simonsen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Red Ink, found in my parents' old collection of Reader's Digests, is not what today's readers would call literary fiction. If you're looking for a fast-paced, new-suspect-every-fifth-page Russian crime story, this note's for you.

I enjoyed the read. It's hokey at times, and the main character, journalist Nikolai Katkov, wants to bed every woman he sees. But you must take the book for what it is: a thriller. Chase scenes are fun. Bad guys sometimes wear designer suits. Guns, guns, guns.

I appreciated the author's knowledge of Russia at the end of the Cold War. He did know some history. Russia attempting democracy was and is a crazy, corrupt thing to witness.

[Vitor Frazão · Rating 3 out of 5]

Não sei porquê estas histórias na Rússia pós-soviética caem-me no goto. Talvez seja pelo romantismo da perda de um ideal que nunca existiu ou pelo fatalismo duro, misturado com humor.

A história não é nenhuma pedra no charco, mas consegue ser apelativa o suficiente para manter o leitor interessado, enquanto nos deixamos envolver pelo protagonista e pelo ambiente. Na verdade, a reprodução da atmosfera russa pós-soviética é um dos pontos fortes do livro, sendo particularmente impressionante por o autor não ter qualquer experiência, nem de perto nem de longe, com ela.

[Diane Wachter · Rating 2 out of 5]

RDC-M, V 4, 1994, @ 1994, Read 2/13. Fictin, Suspense. The old Soviet Union is gone. Now there's a ruthless new criminal class - freedom and profit motive have turned modern Moscow into a deadly free-for-all, and a journalist goes from Russia to the U.S. to Cuba and back to Russia to get his story. 2☆'s = Okay.

[Diane Wachter]

Red Ink, Greg Dinallo, RDC-M, #4-94, 2/13. The old Soviet Union is gone. Now there is a ruthless new criminal class. Freedom and profit motive have turned modern Moscow into a deady free-for-all, and a journalist travels from Russia to the U.S. to Cuba and back to Russia to get his story. Okay.

[Kathy Sebesta · Rating 1 out of 5]

Maybe if I knew more about post-Cold War Russia, or cared to learn enough to figure out what Dinallo was trying to achieve, I would have finished this book. As it was I don't and I don't and I didn't.

[Gary Turner · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this book years ago, enjoyed.

[Bill Donhiser · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good post Cold War Thriller, well written with enjoyable characters