Chapter by Chapter features me reading one chapter (or possibly multiple chapter for this one) of the selected book at the time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as read-along book club.
Two chapters but together they add up to 8 pages and a paragraph, so it’s fine. Last time we saw more of Orlov trying to keep control of his assignment. These two chapters also focus on the bad guys.
I have to admit, Orlov the senior is the only thing keeping these guys out of mustache-twirling. Everybody around him, even his own son, are opportunists or trying to restore the USSR or both. Orlov is the only one who has any kind of positive view. He’s a patriot, but more and more he seems in the dark about what Dogin is up to when this is supposed to be Dogin’s pet project. It makes me wonder whether or not he’s going to make it to the end of the book. Twenty plus chapters in and we still don’t know what the guys on the road at the start of the book did wrong, and one of them was on Dogin’s side personally if not officially.
So let’s check with the Russkies for a couple more chapters and see what else we can learn about our adversaries.
Chapter 27: Tuesday, 6:08 AM, Vladivostok
This chapter is an almost useless bit of three pages for the story. The first page is all about the history of Vladivostok, and I don’t care that much. Half of the second page is talking about what Orlov the junior’s team is armed with and what he is armed with. The last page and a half is all that matters unless you’re really into the minutia as Orlov gets his orders from Rossky to protect whatever Dogin’s got in there for his USSR restoration plan, which we already knew. The only thing we get out of this, and could have been told in a paragraph as we check in with the trip or just mention it in passing if nothing eventful happens, is that Orlov Jr thinks this is Zhanin behind this, and could be part of demilitarizing one of the splinter nations who may not want any further ties to Russia. He’s basically a willing dupe on this one and he doesn’t even know it.
Chapter 28: Tuesday, 11:09 PM, Moscow
Here we get introduced to another of Fields-Hutton’s team, Andre Volko. He works for British Intelligence, keeping an eye on his own country because he felt abandoned after the war. He gets a call on his secret Walkman telephone telling him about Fields-Hutton’s death and to head to St. Petersburg for further instructions. On the train, though, he has company.
While I really don’t care about the train station history either, this stuff is clearly a me thing as the people would be into all this minutia may be part of their regular target audience. That’s fine. I totally admit my biases and while I complain about it, it may excite some of you that this stuff is in there. At least it feels like the story is going forward, unlike the previous chapter. I’m curious of Volko was the victim of a trap and it was actually the would-be KGB that told him to go on this train hoping to root out another spy or if they somehow figured him out and moved in, which he feared might happen. It’s not clear but I peaked ahead a bit. His part in this story isn’t done yet, and the book’s big issues thus far feel more personal preference than critical error. I’m disliking the right people.
Next time, however, it’s back to Op-Center to see what they’re picking up on.
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