An unexpected final.
Is it the series finale? ( )

I'm a great fan of Akunin and have read all his Erast Fandorin novels. This is in a way the most interesting of them all - and perhaps the last? Akunin in this novel takes on an aspect of the history of the tsarist police which he didn't touch in earlier books -- the infamous strategy of provokatsiia. Though he changes the names, anyone familiar with the history of the Okhrana will recognize super-agent Azef and his handlers. The book is extraordinarily relevant to today's "war on terror" and shows the tsarist regime as being too clever by half in its effort to manipulate rather than destroy the terrorist underground. I hope there will be more after this one ... ( )