Latest news with #StrandMagazine
Indian Express
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
Gorky Park author Martin Cruz Smith, 82, passes away; 3 books to remember him by
Martin Cruz Smith, author of the acclaimed novel, Gorky Park and its long-running protagonist Arkady Renko, passed away on July 11 at age 82 in San Rafael, California. His death was confirmed by his publisher Simon & Schuster on Tuesday. Over a decades-long career that spanned Cold War paranoia to the present-day Russo-Ukrainian conflict, Smith created thrillers known for their pulse-pounding plots, deep psychological insight and nuanced political context. A post shared by Simon & Schuster (@simonandschuster) His final novel, Hotel Ukraine, published just this week, brings to a close one of modern literature's most enduring detective series. 'My longevity is linked to Arkady's,' Smith told Strand Magazine in 2023. 'As long as he remains intelligent, humorous, and romantic, so shall I.' Born Martin William Smith in Reading, Pennsylvania, he took the name 'Cruz' from his maternal grandmother, crafting a literary persona that would eventually earn him the Hammett Prize, the Gold Dagger, and the prestigious title of 'grand master' from the Mystery Writers of America. His books explored the shifting tides of Russian history, from the Soviet era to the age of oligarchs and war. He was praised for his meticulous research, often drawn from his own travels in Russia. His first major success, Gorky Park, became a worldwide bestseller and a Hollywood film starring William Hurt. With it, Smith didn't just introduce readers to Arkady Renko—he transformed Moscow itself into a living, breathing character. 'Russia is a character in my Renko stories, always,' he told Publishers' Weekly in 2013. Smith is survived by his wife, Emily; his brother, Jack; three children; and five grandchildren. The novel made Smith a household name, Gorky Park and introduced readers to Moscow detective Arkady Renko, who investigates a gruesome triple murder during the Cold War. Renko's pursuit of justice leads him through a web of corruption, politics, and international intrigue. Cruz blends procedural grit with political intrigue, and remains a benchmark in the genre. The crime procedural is also a commentary on the oppressive Soviet society of the time. Winner of the Hammett Prize, this fourth installment in the Renko series finds the former Inspector for the Moscow Militsiya, Arkady Renko, in Cuba, unraveling a mystery steeped in tropical decay and political ghosts. Renkois tasked with identifying a liquefying corpse dragged from the oily waters of Havana Bay. This time Criz turns his attention to a decaying country in the final recess of Communism. The detective who is in an extremely dark place finds a reason to relish his life again. Hotel Ukraine is the 11th and final installment in the Renko series. His final novel and fitting swan song, Hotel Ukraine brings Renko into the heart of the Russo-Ukrainian war. Released just days before his death, it serves as a fitting capstone to Smith's legacy as the legendary Russian detective returns to Moscow. The detective (much like the author himself) has struggled to keep his declining health a secret, but the worsening symptoms have become impossible to hide. Still, Renko is determined to crack the case of a Russian defense official mysteriously murdered in his Moscow hotel room as Russia's war on Ukraine rages. The murder takes place at the Hotel Ukraine, a well-known hotel in the heart of Moscow. It is only when readers each the end of the book that they learn that Smith like Renko, had also been concealing a Parkinson's diagnosis for years.
1News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- 1News
Martin Cruz Smith, acclaimed author of Gorky Park, dies
Martin Cruz Smith, the best-selling mystery novelist who engaged readers for decades with Gorky Park and other thrillers featuring Moscow investigator Arkady Renko, has died at age 82. Smith died Friday at a senior living community in San Rafael, California, 'surrounded by those he loved,' according to his publisher, Simon & Schuster. Smith revealed a decade ago that he had Parkinson's disease, and he gave the same condition to his protagonist. His 11th Renko book, Hotel Ukraine, was published this week and billed as his last. 'My longevity is linked to Arkady's,' he told Strand Magazine in 2023. 'As long as he remains intelligent, humorous, and romantic, so shall I.' Smith was often praised for his storytelling and for his insights into modern Russia; he would speak of being interrogated at length by customs officials during his many trips there. The Associated Press called Hotel Ukraine a 'gem' that 'upholds Smith's reputation as a great craftsman of modern detective fiction with his sharply drawn, complex characters and a compelling plot.' Smith's honours included being named a 'grand master' by the Mystery Writers of America, winning the Hammett Prize for Havana Bay and a Gold Dagger award for Gorky Park. ADVERTISEMENT Born Martin William Smith in Reading, Pennsylvania, he studied creative writing at the University of Pennsylvania and started out as a journalist, including a brief stint at the AP and at the Philadelphia Daily News. Success as an author arrived slowly. He had been a published novelist for more than a decade before he broke through in the early 1980s with Gorky Park. His novel came out when the Soviet Union and the Cold War were still very much alive and centred on Renko's investigation into the murders of three people whose bodies were found in the Moscow park that Smith used for the book's title. Gorky Park, cited by the New York Times as a reminder of 'just how satisfying a smoothly turned thriller can be,' topped the Times' fiction bestseller list and was later made into a movie starring William Hurt. "Russia is a character in my Renko stories, always," Smith told Publishers Weekly in 2013. "Gorky Park may have been one of the first books to take a backdrop and make it into a character. It took me forever to write because of my need to get things right. You've got to knock down the issue of 'Does this guy know what he's talking about or not?'' Smith's other books include science fiction (The Indians Won), the Westerns North to Dakota and Ride to Revenge, and the Romano Grey mystery series. Besides Martin Cruz Smith — Cruz was his maternal grandmother's name — he also wrote under the pen names Nick Carter and Simon Quinn. The morning's headlines in 90 seconds, including Trump's deadline for Russia, legal action against a supermarket giant, and an unusual marathon record. (Source: Breakfast) Smith's Renko books were inspired in part by his own travels and he would trace the region's history over the past 40 years, whether the Soviet Union's collapse (Red Square), the rise of Russian oligarchs (The Siberian Dilemma), or, in the novel Wolves Eats Dogs, the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. By the time he began working on his last novel, Russia had invaded Ukraine. The AP noted in its review of Hotel Ukraine that Smith had devised a backstory 'pulled straight from recent headlines,' referencing such world leaders as Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine,Vladimir Putin of Russia and former President Joe Biden of the US. ADVERTISEMENT Smith is survived by his brother, Jack Smith; his wife, Emily Smith; three children and five grandchildren.
Los Angeles Times
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
‘Gorky Park' writer Martin Cruz Smith, acclaimed for his mysteries, dies at 82
NEW YORK — Martin Cruz Smith, the best-selling mystery novelist who engaged readers for decades with 'Gorky Park' and other thrillers featuring Moscow investigator Arkady Renko, has died at age 82. Smith died Friday at a senior living community in San Rafael, 'surrounded by those he loved,' according to his publisher, Simon & Schuster. Smith revealed a decade ago that he had Parkinson's disease, and he gave the same condition to his protagonist. His 11th Renko book, 'Hotel Ukraine,' was published July 8 and billed as his last. 'My longevity is linked to Arkady's,' he told Strand Magazine in 2023. 'As long as he remains intelligent, humorous, and romantic, so shall I.' Smith was often praised for his storytelling and for his insights into modern Russia; he would speak of being interrogated at length by customs officials during his many trips there. The Associated Press called 'Hotel Ukraine' a 'gem' that 'upholds Smith's reputation as a great craftsman of modern detective fiction with his sharply drawn, complex characters and a compelling plot.' Smith's honors included being named a 'grand master' by the Mystery Writers of America, winning the Hammett Prize for 'Havana Bay' and a Gold Dagger award for 'Gorky Park.' Born Martin William Smith in Reading, Pa. , he studied creative writing at the University of Pennsylvania and started out as a journalist, including a brief stint at the AP and at the Philadelphia Daily News. Success as an author arrived slowly. He had been a published novelist for more than a decade before he broke through in the early 1980s with 'Gorky Park.' His novel came out when the Soviet Union and the Cold War were still very much alive and centered on Renko's investigation into the murders of three people whose bodies were found in the Moscow park that Smith used for the book's title. 'Gorky Park,' cited by the New York Times as a reminder of 'just how satisfying a smoothly turned thriller can be,' topped the Times' fiction bestseller list and was later made into a movie starring William Hurt. 'Russia is a character in my Renko stories, always,' Smith told Publishers Weekly in 2013. ''Gorky Park' may have been one of the first books to take a backdrop and make it into a character. It took me forever to write because of my need to get things right. You've got to knock down the issue of 'Does this guy know what he's talking about or not?'' Smith's other books include science fiction ('The Indians Won'), the Westerns 'North to Dakota' and 'Ride for Revenge,' and the 'Roman Grey' mystery series. Besides 'Martin Cruz Smith' — Cruz was his maternal grandmother's name — he also wrote under the pen names 'Nick Carter' and 'Simon Quinn.' Smith's Renko books were inspired in part by his own travels and he would trace the region's history over the past 40 years, whether it be the Soviet Union's collapse ('Red Square'), the rise of Russian oligarchs ('The Siberian Dilemma') or, in the novel 'Wolves Eats Dogs,' the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. By the time he began working on his last novel, Russia had invaded Ukraine. The AP noted in its review of 'Hotel Ukraine' that Smith had devised a backstory 'pulled straight from recent headlines,' referencing such world leaders as Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin of Russia and former President Joe Biden of the U.S. Smith is survived by his brother, Jack Smith; his wife, Emily Smith; three children and five grandchildren. Italie writes for the Associated Press.
Indian Express
16-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
A new story by Graham Greene, an invitation to reassess a familiar author
The wind keens outside the window, the rain a whiplash on the shutters. Inside a rented apartment on the French Riviera, a solitary traveller reads to pass the interminable hours of the storm. The posthumous discovery of Graham Greene's ghost story 'Reading at Night', possibly written in 1962 and only just published in Strand Magazine, a Michigan-based quarterly, offers more than just a literary footnote. It reveals the elasticity of a writer best known for his Catholic guilt-laced thrillers and political novels. Discovered in the archives of the University of Texas at Austin, the story's haunted atmosphere, the tension between memory and perception, its spectral uncertainty, reveal a writer attuned to the darkness that lingers just beyond the reach of reason. One of the finest writers of the 20th century, Greene is not alone in genre detours. The same edition of the magazine also carries a short story by Ian Fleming about a faded journalist grappling with the summons from a media baron, a departure from his flamboyant James Bond series. From Henry James's eerie Turn of the Screw (1898) to the genre-bending fiction of Margaret Atwood and Kazuo Ishiguro, writers have often strayed from familiar ground to pursue artistic reinvention. These forays reflect not inconsistency, but range — and a willingness to engage with a broader emotional spectrum of storytelling. There is also something magnetic about 'lost' stories. When forgotten works surface, they invite readers to reassess familiar authors through unfamiliar lenses. They serve as time capsules, preserving the anxieties, experiments, or ambitions that didn't fit neatly into a writer's canon. For a new generation, these offer a chance to encounter literary titans not through weighty reputations but through more intimate pieces. 'Reading at Night' may be a ghost story, but its real power lies in re-animating Greene, reminding readers that even great storytellers can live outside their legacies, experimenting on the margins.
The Guardian
14-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘Eerie gem' of an unearthed Graham Greene story published in Strand Magazine
A short ghost story by Graham Greene described by analysts as 'an eerie gem' was published for the first time on Wednesday, a rare glimpse into the largely uncelebrated darker side of one of the giants of 20th-century literature. Reading at Night appears in the 75th issue of Strand Magazine, a New York literary quarterly that has built a reputation for finding and publishing 'lost' writings of well-known authors. The landmark edition also makes widely available for the first time a previously little-known short story by renowned spy novelist Ian Fleming, author of the James Bond series of books. Greene's tale delves into a resurrection of 'childhood fears and imagined horrors' experienced by a terrified solo male traveler as he reads supernatural stories in bed on a stormy night on the French Riviera. The story was probably written in 1962, Greene biographer Jon Wise told Strand, during a relatively barren period of his career in which the English writer said he 'didn't have a novel in him'. It is a departure from the deeper and more complex style of writing expressed in Greene's better-known psychological and political thrillers including The Third Man, Our Man in Havana, The Power and the Glory, and Brighton Rock. 'Greene wasn't just a masterful novelist, he also excelled at the short story form, producing numerous classics,' said Andrew F Gulli, managing editor of Strand Magazine. 'As a huge admirer of Graham Greene, whom I've often considered one of the 10 greatest writers of the 20th century, this piece was a personal highlight. It's especially meaningful given that he published a chilling ghost story, A Little Place Off the Edgware Road, in the original Strand Magazine back in 1939. 'While the story featured here may carry less overt menace, it still demonstrates Greene's remarkable ability to hold a reader's attention and subtly blur the line between entertainment and drama. Greene is a very serious author, and here there's humor. It's a playful yet chilling nod to the great supernatural stylists.' In the story, the protagonist recalls how reading Dracula and horror stories by MR James traumatized him as a child, and from then 'he had never enjoyed reading alone in bed anything which might prove ghostly or violent'. So when he finds himself alone in the bedroom of a 'strange' rented house on the Côte d'Azur, in the middle of a raging storm, and with only a paperback anthology of stories for company, his old fears come rushing back. In both the creepy story he reads, and the bedroom he is reading it in, there are mysterious scratching noises on the glass of the windows. Gulli said the manuscript was found in archives at the Harry Ransom Center library at the University of Texas at Austin, and was subsequently evaluated and transcribed by Camilla Greene, steward of the Greene literary estate and granddaughter of the writer, who died in 1991. 'This eerie gem remained tucked away until now,' Gulli said. 'It's a story you can identify with. Weird things can happen to you when you're traveling alone, not weird like this story, but I've had odd knocks on the door in the middle of the night, or some unusual creaking, or you have a nightmare or something. 'It's kind of like an everyday event and Graham Greene, with his great turn of phrase, his great style, turns it into something where it's a what-if that can go a little too far, but just far enough to have a lot of interest to it.' The story by Fleming, meanwhile, called The Shameful Dream, is also a separation from the author's traditional fare. It builds suspense through a series of recollections of previous firings as a London periodical's literary editor prepares for a potentially fateful meeting with the publication's overbearing proprietor. 'While forever associated with the tuxedoed glamor of 007, Fleming was a talent who could transcend genre,' Gulli said. 'This piece has no martinis, no Aston Martins and no villains bent on world domination. It's a quietly unsettling story about a washed-up journalist wrestling with the dread of an invitation to a sadistic media mogul's mansion, a tale more literary than spy thriller, revealing Fleming's lesser-known capacity for irony and sharp social observation.' The story will also feature in Talk of the Devil, a collection of Fleming's writings incorporating short-form fiction, travel essays, lectures, and correspondence with his friend and crime novelist Raymond Chandler, set to be published later this month. In July, 22 of Greene's short stories will feature in another new collection, called Duel Duet, published by Penguin.
