Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin has a problem. Several, actually. Not the least of them is the fact that a powerful Soviet boss has been murdered, and Matyushkin's surly commander has given him an unreasonably short time frame to close the case.

Then there is the KGB colonel who seems a bit too interested in the course of Matyushkin's investigation... and Pavel's womanizing office mate, who gets involved with a subject of the case... and a series of petty burglaries that defy resolution... and of course Pavel's complicated love interest, who is as prickly as she is perceptive...

In his debut Russian crime novel set in 1960s Moscow, Alexei Bayer peels back the layers of late Soviet life to offer a vivid, gripping tale of deception, greed, murder, and a simple detective just trying to do his job.