From Publishers Weekly
Prolific thriller writer Hagberg (
Dance with the Dragon) and former Soviet naval officer Gindin recount the 1975 mutiny aboard the FFG
Storozhevoy, a Russian antisubmarine warfare ship, which inspired Tom Clancy's international bestseller. Gindin was a senior lieutenant and chief engineer on the
Storozhevoy when it was seized by Capt. Third Rank Valery Sablin. An idealist who actually believes the Party line, Sablin intended to sail the ship into the Baltic Sea and broadcast an appeal to the Russian people to overthrow the corrupt Kremlin leadership. He secured the crew's support by promising them an early out from the navy, and arrested the captain and the ship's officers, including Gindin, who refused to cooperate. Upon hearing the news, Kremlin leader Leonid Brezhnev ordered his navy to find that ship and sink it. Under attack, the mutiny fizzled and the ship and crew were spared, but the personal repercussions were severe. Another nonfiction account of the
Storozhevoy mutiny,
The Last Sentry, was published in 2005, but the eyewitness testimony of coauthor Gindin justifies a retelling. Unfortunately, tutorials on subjects as diverse as historical mutinies and Soviet executions slow the narrative, and the documentation is bare bones.
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Review
"Truth is not only stranger than fiction, but, in the case of Mutiny, a great deal more interesting. A fascinating, first-hand account that unveils a remarkable historical event with the narrative power of a first-rate thriller."
--Ralph Peters, bestselling author of Wars of Blood and Faith
"Communist Russia was the most incomprehensible, vindictive, evil society on earth, yet the dream of escape to a better life was still there, a shimmering, golden phantasm in a bleak, gray world. Hagberg and Gindin have painted a rich, vivid portrait of men who traded everything, including their lives, for a chance to seize that dream."
--Stephen Coonts, bestselling author of The Traitor
