Discover
Book Series

Heron Books

Minsik readers
0.0
0 ratings
Other platforms
4.0
75 ratings
24
BOOKS
6,874
PAGES
~114h 34min
READING TIME

About Author

Martin Cruz Smith

Martin William Smith (November 3, 1942 – July 11, 2025), known professionally as Martin Cruz Smith, was an American writer of mystery and suspense fiction, mostly in an international or historical setting. He was best known for his 11-book series featuring Russian investigator Arkady Renko, who was introduced in 1981 with Gorky Park and last appeared in Hotel Ukraine (2025).

Description

A triple murder in a Moscow amusement center: three corpses found frozen in the snow, faces and fingers missing. Chief homicide investigator Arkady Renko is brilliant, sensitive, honest, and cynical about everything except his profession. To identify the victims and uncover the truth, he must battle the KGB, FBI and New York police as he pursues a rich, ruthless, and well-connected American fur dealer. Meanwhile, Arkady is falling in love with a beautiful, headstrong dissident for whom he may risk everything... Rich in insight, powerfully written, unrelentingly suspenseful, and impeccable in its portrayal of Moscow life, here is Gorky Park.

How the series evolves

beginning
#1 Gorky Park
3.8· strong start
peak
The cinder path
5.0· best book in series
the pit
Hannah Massey
0.0
finale
Menfreya
3.5· sticks the landing
overall
3.0· it's a rollercoaster

Books in this Series

#1

Gorky Park

3.8 (10)
0

A triple murder in a Moscow amusement center: three corpses found frozen in the snow, faces and fingers missing. Chief homicide investigator Arkady Renko is brilliant, sensitive, honest, and cynical about everything except his profession. To identify the victims and uncover the truth, he must battle the KGB, FBI and New York police as he pursues a rich, ruthless, and well-connected American fur dealer. Meanwhile, Arkady is falling in love with a beautiful, headstrong dissident for whom he may risk everything... Rich in insight, powerfully written, unrelentingly suspenseful, and impeccable in its portrayal of Moscow life, here is Gorky Park.

Knock down

5.0 (1)
0

Ex-jockey Jonah Dereham agrees to bid on a young steeplechaser for a wealthy American woman. But right after the auction Dereham and his client are threatened by thugs who want the horse.

Dead cert

3.0 (1)
0

Jockey Bill Davidson's accident seems suspicious to his friend Alan Yorke who goes back to check the fence where Bill Davidson fell, and finds length of wire on the ground. The wire disappears before the police arrive to check Alan's story, so he must find out what happened himself.

Marathon man

4.0 (3)
0

Tom "Babe" Levy is a runner in every sense: racing tirelessly toward his goals of athletic and academic excellence--and endlessly away from the specter of his famous father's scandal-driven suicide. But an unexpected visit from his beloved older brother will set in motion a chain of events that plunge Babe into a vortex of terror, treachery, and murder--and force him into a race for his life ... and for the answer to the fateful question, "Is it safe?"--Publisher.

Blood sport

4.3 (4)
0

In July 1993, White House official Vincent Foster wrote an anguished lament: "in Washington...ruining people is considered a sport.". Nine days later, Foster was dead. Shock at the apparent suicide of one of President Clinton's top aides turned to mystery, then suspicion, as the White House became engulfed in an ever-widening net of unanswered questions. Among the confidential matters Foster was working on when he died was the Clintons' ill-fated investment in Whitewater, an Arkansas land development. Soon conspiracy theories were circulating, alleging that Foster was murdered because he knew too much. And the Whitewater affair, a minor footnote to the 1992 presidential campaign, was suddenly resurrected in the national media. To a degree that left them stunned and at times depressed, the president and first lady have been buffeted by a succession of scandals, from the first lady's profitable commodities trading to the sexual harassment allegations of Paula Jones. Like its predecessors, the Clinton presidency soon found itself engulfed in allegations of scandal, conspiracy, and cover-up. . Drawing on hundreds of interviews, many with people speaking publicly for the first time, James B. Stewart sheds startling new light on these and other mysteries of the Clinton White House. In a fast paced narrative that ranges from a backwater town in the Ozarks to the Oval Office, from newsrooms in New York and Los Angeles to offices of conservative think tanks and special prosecutors, the result is an unprecedented portrait of political combat as it is waged in America today. Going beyond the news headlines, Blood Sport also tells the fascinating stories of key figures at the heart of the action, such as Jim McDougal, once Clinton's political and financial mentor, and his glamorous but naive wife, Susan, who swept the Clintons into their real estate empire, then faced financial ruin. It is the story of top national reporters and editors such as Jeff Gerth of The New York Times, who broke the Whitewater story only to find himself the object of controversy. It is the story of David Bossie, the tireless conservative operative who became a one-man army against the Clintons and even penetrated a network news operation. It is the story of Paula Jones, a small-town girl with dreams of Hollywood, and of the Arkansas state troopers who broke their code of silence to add fuel to the Clinton scandals. It is the story of prosecutors Kenneth Starr and Robert Fiske, the secretive, powerful independent counsels whose wide-ranging investigations could vindicate - or destroy - a president.

Slay-ride

0.0 (0)
0

Scott Wilkinson is a successful young advertising executive on his way to the top. Christopher Miller is an FBI legend who has been willing to do whatever it takes to see that justice is done. However, at age 50, he is ready to spend more time with his family. Two weeks before Christmas, Scott goes on a routine business trip that will forever entangle their two lives. It starts like so many others. Wilkinson calls for a car service to take him from his home to the airport. But the driver of Lincoln Town Car No. 716 is late. When he finally shows up, he drives like a maniac, and Wilkinson feels fortunate to reach the airport alive. Then, he makes a big mistake. Wilkinson calls the limousine company to complain. Customer Service assures him the bad driver will be dealt with. Nicolai Kyznetsoff looks and sounds like all the anonymous others who whisk successful young executives back and forth to the airport every day, but the man behind the wheel of Car 716 is something much more sinister: an avenging dark angel who will stop at nothing to wreak revenge on the one man he holds responsible for ruining his life.

The Eiger sanction

3.0 (1)
1

College professor, art collector, mountaineer, and freelance assassin Jonathan Hemlock takes on an assignment that means a perilous climb up the Eiger Mountain with a climbing party that includes his quarry.

Cooper's Creek

0.0 (0)
0

x, 222 p. : 22 cm

For kicks

4.3 (3)
0

Australian horse breeder Daniel Roke goes undercover in the British racing industry to find those responsible for illegal horse-doping.

Night of the Seventh Moon

4.3 (4)
0

According to ancient Black Forest legend, on the Night of the Seventh Moon, Loke, the God of Mischief, is at large in the world. It is a night for festivity and joyful celebration. It is a night for singing and dancing. And it is a night for love. Helena Trant was enchanted by everything she found in the Black Forest -- especially its legends. But then, on the Night of the Seventh Moon, she started to live one of them, and the enchantment turned suddenly into a terrifying nightmare . . .

The Pride of the Peacock

4.0 (3)
0

Only the strongest love can combat the dangers attached to this fabled opal stone Victoria Holt takes readers on an exhilarating ride in this mesmerizing classic set in turn-of-the-century England. Raised in the shadow of her family's financial ruin, Jessica Clavering has never been understood or loved at the Dower House. But when a unique inheritance compels her to marry the owner of a fabled opal mine, she leaves her past behind in pursuit of a brighter future in Australia. It's only once they arrive on the far away continent that Jessica starts to uncover her family's dark past.

The Quiet American

4.0 (22)
5

One of Graham Greene's best works. The story is set at the time of the French war against the Viet Cong and tells the story of liberal British journalist Thomas Fowler, his mistress Phuong, and their relationship with American idealist Pyle. The latter is an earnest young man indocrinated with geo-political theory and whose attempts to shape the world to American ideals ends in his own personal tragedy and drastically alters the lives of the other two participants. Written before the US involvement in Vietnam this is a strangely prophetic work and seriously encapsulates the British viewpoint towards that conflict. A beautifully written book and highly recommended.

A Burnt-Out Case

2.5 (2)
0

Querry is assigned to a leper colony on the upper reaches of the Congo, run by a doctor as lacking in faith as he is himself.

The tightrope men

5.0 (1)
0

Giles Denison's life is turned upside down when he awakes to find himself in a luxurious hotel in Oslo and, peering into the bathroom mirror, discovers the face of another man! He has been kidnapped from his flat in London and transformed into famous Finnish scientist, Dr Harold Feltham Meyrick. Compelled to adjust to his new persona (including meeting his daughter) and to play out the role assigned to him by his captors, he embarks on a dangerous escapade from Norway to Finland and across the border into Soviet Russia.

The Shivering Sands

4.8 (5)
0

Caroline Verlaine, the lovely young widow of a world-famous pianist, comes to the legend-haunted Stacy estate to investigate the disappearance of her sister, Roma. As Caroline falls under the spell of the Stacy family and its macabre past, she becomes aware that her sister must have discovered some deadly secret amid the nearby ruins -- a secret that cost Roma her life. A secret that now threatens Caroline . . .e

The Salamander

0.0 (0)
0

A book that came to me from MC, on the back of the "shoes of the fisherman", this story is again set in Italy at a time of crisis. The death of a general sets into play a series of events that point to a coup led by the intelligence agencies. Our hero Dante, like his namesake, has to go through the stage of hell, purgatory and heaven several times in order to try to achieve his goal of deflecting this coup. The plot twists and turns like the switchback roads of the Alps, information given by characters in the book is often unreliable, and like Daniel in conversation with the Archangel Michael, we only see in part that which is occurring. This sense of unease, and 'who do I trust', means that you can't assume you know what is going to happen. (from Goodreads)

The Mask of the Enchantress

4.0 (1)
0

From the moment young Suewellyn saw the Mateland family castle she wanted it. But how could she, an illegitimate beauty hidden away by her parents, have such a dream? A perilous deception seems her only hope. But the masquerade succeeds and, too late, she learns the true nature of the woman she has chosen to become. Suewellyn faces a desperate choice -- losing the man she loves or confronting the tragedy that haunts every Mateland bride.

The king of the castle

4.3 (7)
1

Dallas Lawson is determined to continue her dead father's work, but she finds her reception at Chateau Gaillard, where she is restoring the paintings, less than welcoming. She also finds that the enigmatic owner, the Comte de la Talle, is accused of murder by his own daughter.

Trial run

0.0 (0)
1

Reese Clawson's work is mind-bending--literally. Her company specializes in global data analysis for an elite group of industry executives, and now a lucrative government contract is moving her into the realm of cutting-edge intelligence gathering. She is determined to crack the limits of consciousness--and in doing so, the boundaries of secrets and lies. But her experiment crashes as test subjects slide into a coma-like state. Reese is left scrambling to maintain control, drawing three disparate people into the search for answers--an adrenaline-amped thrill junkie with altered brain chemistry, an Italian scientist working on remote-viewing technology, and a math prodigy whose algorithms subvert computer encryption.

Menfreya

3.5 (4)
0

For Harriet Delvaney, the great house of Menfreya, standing like a fortress on the Cornish coast, had always been a citadel of happiness and high spirits. Not until she herself came to Menfreya as a bride did Harriet discover the secret family legend of infidelity, jealousy and murder. And not until the legend seemed to come dangerously to life did Harriet begin to believe the old story that when the tower clock of Menfreya stopped, someone was about to die . . .