Fresh off the case of a deranged student who murdered his landlady, noted police investigator Porfiry Petrovich barely takes a breath before a bizarre and very grisly double murder lands him back on the streets of the tsarist St. Petersburg he knows all too well. The sardonic sleuth follows a trail from the drinking dens of the Haymarket district to an altogether more genteel stratum of societyaa hunt that leads him to a conclusion even he will find shocking. In the tradition of such first-rate historical novels such as "The Alienist" and "The Dante Club, The Gentle Axe" is atmospheric and tense storytelling from its dramatic opening to its stunning climax.