Havana Bay (HB) - used book

Russian detective Arkady Renko made his debut in Martin Cruz Smith's powerful 1981 novel Gorky Park. An enigmatic and complex character, he made further appearances in Polar Star and Red Square. In Havana Bay Renko has gone to Cuba to identify the body of an old colleague. It seems a simple enough task, but the putrefying corpse is unrecognisable as a human being and the authorities' insistence that he agree with their conclusions serves only to make Renko more stubborn. Soon it becomes apparent that his unexpected arrival is ruffling some powerful feathers. Finding himself in a strange limbo Renko slowly forms a bond with Detective Ofelia Osorio whose revolutionary zeal is tempered by her pragmatic intelligence. Unofficially investigating the case with Ofelia leads Renko to be gradually enmeshed in a world where conflicting cultures and the fallout from past events threaten to destroy what proves to be a deceptive calm. Martin Cruz Smith evokes beautifully the faded, colonial grandeur of Havana and its revolutionary legacy; its sense of a society whose engagement with history has left it outside of time. The pleasures of Havana Bay are of the slow-burning variety, but are all the more satisfying as a result. --Jonathan Crawford