Letter from a Reader 4.8.26

A pink flag but not a red one about Patrick Radden Keefe's new book about an unexplained death, 'London Falling'

Patrick Radden Keefe / Doubleday

London Falling came out yesterday, and by the end of the first chapter, I’d realized that I might have been unfair to Russian oligarchs. In my mind I’d pictured them all sitting around a solid-gold samovar that they had stolen, drinking tea with their best friend, Vladimir Putin.

But some of those oligarchs have tried to clip Putin’s wings. Or so I learned from the new book by Patrick Radden Keefe, whose Empire of Pain I loved. Keefe writes:

“The dissolution of the USSR in 1991 sparked one of the most dramatic wealth transfers in the history of the world, as large swaths of formerly state-owned industry were rapidly privatized, in a quick and messy fashion, under circumstances that were anything but transparent.”

A group of “free-market bandits” accumulated fortunes by gaining control of assets that belonged, in theory, to the Soviet people. They became known as the oligarchs. And among the most brazen was Boris Berezovsky, a billionaire who boasted that he and six other men controlled 50% of Russia’s economy.

Putin tried to rein in the oligarchs after becoming president of Russia in 2000. But Berezovsky and others pushed back, trying in vain to oust Putin from exile.

An unexplained plunge from a balcony

Some oligarchs settled in England, and their influx plays a role in London Falling, which investigates the unexplained death of a 19-year-old who posed as a Russian billionaire’s son. Keefe is a wonderful storyteller, and I’m enjoying his new book as much as I did Empire of Pain.

But Keefe lacked a Scotland Yard source who could confirm his view of why young Zac Brettler plunged from the balcony of a luxury high-rise in London in 2019. He based the book “chiefly on countless hours of conversation” with the dead teenager’s parents, and his conclusion about what happened aligns with theirs. That isn’t a red flag, but it’s a pink one. Meaning: You’re getting an incomplete and possibly unpersuasive view of the story.

I plan to finish the book, anyway, with my guard up, if it stays as enjoyable as it’s been so far. If I do, I’ll review it soon. Keefe’s gifts include an ability to ferret out memorable quotes. And my favorite so far involves a comment by Boris Johnson, then the mayor of London, after the rich foreign nationals began to flow into the city.

“London is to the billionaire as the jungles of Sumatra are to the orangutan,” he said. “We’re proud of that.”

Jan Harayda is an award-winning critic and journalist who has been the book editor of a large newspaper and a vice president of the National Book Critics Circle.

Selected Notes

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/704979/london-falling-by-patrick-radden-keefe/

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/letter-from-london

https://www.thebailliegiffordprize.co.uk/books-and-authors/empire-of-pain-by-patrick-radden-keefe