
Martin Cruz Smith, acclaimed author of 'Gorky Park,' dies at 82
Smith died Friday 'surrounded by those he loved,' according to his publisher, Simon & Schuster. Further details were not immediately available, but Smith revealed a decade ago that he had Parkinson's disease, and he gave the same condition to his protagonist.
His 11th and final Renko book, 'Hotel Ukraine,' will be published this week. The Associated Press praised it as 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.'
Among Smith's honors were being named a 'grand master' by the Mystery Writers of America, and winning the Hammett Prize for 'Havana Bay' and a Gold Dagger award for 'Gorky Park.'
Born Martin William Smith in Reading, Pennsylvania, and a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied creative writing, Smith started out as a journalist, including a brief stint at the . He had been a published novelist for more than a decade before he broke through in the early 1980s with 'Gorky Park." His book 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 cited in the title.
'Gorky Park,' praised as a compelling and informative take on the inner workings of the Soviet Union, topped The New York Times' fiction bestseller list and was later made into a movie starring William Hurt.
″'Gorky Park' is a police procedural of uncommon excellence," Peter Andrews wrote in the Times in 1981. 'Martin Cruz Smith has managed to combine the gritty atmosphere of a Moscow police squad room with a story of detection as neatly done as any English manor-house puzzlement. I have no idea as to the accuracy of Mr. Smith's descriptions of Russian police operations. But they ring as true as crystal.'
Smith's other books include science fiction , 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.'
Smith's Renko books were inspired in part by his own travels in the Soviet Union and he would trace the region's history over the past 40 years, whether the Soviet Union's collapse , war in Chechnya , or the rise of Russian oligarchs .
The noted in its review of 'Hotel Ukraine' that Smith had devised a backstory pulled straight from recent headlines, referencing such world leaders as Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine,Vladimir Putin of Russia and former President Joe Biden of the U.S.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Time of India
3 hours ago
- Time of India
Kyiv attacks with drones as Putin marks navy day
Ukrainian drones targeted St. Petersburg on Sunday, Russia said, forcing the airport to close for five hours as Vladimir Putin marked Russia's Navy Day in the city, despite the earlier cancellation of its naval parade due to security concerns. Russian defence ministry said air defence units downed 291 Ukrainian drones Sunday.


Time of India
9 hours ago
- Time of India
Boat capsizes in Nigeria's Niger state, at least 25 people feared dead, authorities say
Boat capsizes in Nigeria's Niger state, at least 25 people feared dead Abuja, Jul 27 (AP) A boat transporting passengers to a market in north-central Nigeria capsized, killing at least 25 people, authorities said Sunday. The accident happened Saturday near Gumu village in the Shiroro area of Niger state, Ibrahim Hussaini, an official with the National Emergency Management Agency, told The Associated Press. Hussaini said search and rescue efforts were underway, but are limited because armed gangs mostly control the area. He added that the number of casualties may rise. "Very few people can go to the scene because of banditry in that area," he told the AP. Armed groups, commonly referred to as bandits, have stepped up attacks in recent months in the north-central region, complicating rescue efforts. The accident is the latest in a series of deadly boat accidents on Nigerian waterways, where accidents are common in remote communities, especially during the rainy season, due to overloaded and poorly maintained vessels. In September last year, a boat carrying mostly farmers capsized on a river in the northwestern state of Zamfara, drowning at least 40 people. At least 326 people died in boat accidents in Nigeria in 2024, according to a count by TheCable, a local media outlet. Analysts say many boats operate without life jackets and blame weak enforcement by regulatory authorities.(AP)

Hindustan Times
13 hours ago
- Hindustan Times
Russia cancels annual navy parade citing 'security reasons'
Russia said on Sunday a major annual navy parade had been cancelled for "security reasons", without specifying the threat or concern. The drills, launched earlier this week in the Baltic and Caspian seas as well as in the Arctic and Pacific oceans, involved more than 150 ships and over 15,000 troops, Putin said(Reuters) "It has to do with the general situation. Security reasons are of utmost importance," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, quoted by Russian news agencies. The parade was meant to be the highlight of Russia's Navy Day, which falls on the last Sunday of July each year and honours the country's sailors. But local authorities in the coastal city of Saint Petersburg, where the warships and submarines were scheduled to pass, said on Friday the parade had been cancelled without giving a reason. Russian President Vladimir Putin -- who re-established Navy Day in 2017, nearly four decades after it was cancelled in Soviet times -- appeared in a video message hailing the "bravery" and "heroism" of Russia's sailors participating in the offensive in Ukraine. "We are celebrating the holiday in a working atmosphere," Putin said later on Sunday, in a video address to Russian forces involved in large-scale naval manoeuvres called "July Storm". The drills, launched earlier this week in the Baltic and Caspian seas as well as in the Arctic and Pacific oceans, involved more than 150 ships and over 15,000 troops, Putin said. "Our main task is to ensure Russia's security and firmly protect the sovereignty and national interests," Putin said in Saint Petersburg, where he was travelling on Sunday, according to the Kremlin. Russia, which launched its military operation on Ukraine in February 2022 with daily bombardments of its neighbour, has faced retaliatory Ukrainian drone strikes on its territory in recent months. The Russian defence ministry said on Sunday that 100 Ukrainian drones were downed overnight. At least 10 of them were intercepted not far from Saint Petersburg and a woman was wounded, the governor for the northwestern Leningrad region, Aleksandr Drozdenko, said on Telegram. That drone assault also disrupted operations at Saint Petersburg's Pulkovo airport, delaying dozens of flights, the facility's authorities said.