Snowdrops by A. D. Miller

I picked this novel out because it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2011, and I usually enjoy that cohort of novels. The judges for this years prize have beencriticized for picking books that are enjoyable stories--I am not so sure about that--two of the ones that I have read involve murder and mayhem, and this is one of them.
A quote that adresses Russian novels in general aptly describes this book. 'There are no politics stories. There are no love stories. There are only crime stories." Russia's position on the world stage is such that you can say whatever you like about it, thanks to a widespread willingness to believe the very worst.
This is a crime story, as its title suggests: "snowdrop" is Moscow slang for a corpse concealed by snow, revealed when the thaw comes. Surprise! At the start, though, the narrator, Nicholas, is naive enough to think it might be a love story--he is apparently unfamiliar with the above stated paradigm. The plot charts his slowly dawning realization that this is no romance, along with his downscaling of hopes and ambitions, with chilling efficiency.
Here is the basic scene. It's boomtime in Russia, and Nicholas is an expat lawyer working on behalf of foreign banks that want to lend money to Russian businesses, especially in the oil industry. In his own words, his job is smearing "lipstick on a pig" – sanitising dodgy deals with covenants and sureties no one involved will respect anyway. He has money to spend, so he enjoys Moscow's exotic decadence. He's 38 and rudderless, terrified of suburbia and of ending up in a boring, loveless marriage like his parents'.
One day, travelling home on the metro, he fights off a mugger, "a noble deed in a ruthless place". The intended victim was not him but Masha, an alluring femme fatale who is invariably accompanied by her younger sister, Katya. Masha and Nicholas become an item – he genuinely thinks he's in love – but it's obvious he's been caught in some type of honey-trap. The question is: which type?
We find out which type as the story rolls out. A very good read indeed.