City of Thieves (novel)

City of Thieves

UK hardcover edition cover artwork
Author	David Benioff
Language	English
Genre	Historical fiction
Publisher	Viking/Penguin
Publication date	2008
Publication place	United States
Pages	258 pp.
ISBN	0-670-01870-8

City of Thieves is a 2008 historical fiction novel by David Benioff. It is, in part, a coming of age story set in the World War II siege of Leningrad. It follows the adventures of two youths as they desperately search for a dozen eggs at the behest of a Soviet NKVD officer, a task that takes them far behind enemy lines. It was released by Plume on May 15, 2008.

The audiobook, narrated by Ron Perlman, was released by Penguin Audio on January 8, 2009.

Plot

The novel begins with David, an American screenwriter, as the narrator. When asked to write an autobiographical essay, David decides to write about Leningrad, where his grandfather grew up, instead. He flies to Florida to speak with his grandfather, and for a week David records his grandfather's stories. David also makes note of the fact that his grandmother never cooks.

The narrator changes to David's grandfather, Lev, on New Year's Eve 1942 in Leningrad, Russia. Food is scarce due to the German siege of the city. Though his mother and sister have fled the city, Lev, at 17, stays behind to work as a firefighter. One night while sitting on the roof of his apartment building with his friends, they spot a German soldier falling from the sky in a parachute and they run down into the street to investigate. When the German lands in the street, the friends loot the corpse, with Lev taking the man's knife. Russian troops arrive and nearly arrest the group for looting, but all except for Lev escape.

The soldiers take Lev to the Crosses, the prison in Leningrad. After hours in his pitch dark prison cell a young soldier is ushered into the cell. When they are alone, the young man introduces himself as Kolya, who was accused of desertion, but he tells Lev that in fact he was defending his thesis on Ushakovo's The Courtyard Hound, a book and author whom Lev has never heard of. The next morning, Lev and Kolya are taken to a mansion occupied by the NKVD—the Russian secret police. There, Colonel Grechko tasks them with finding a dozen eggs to make a cake for the Colonel’s daughter's wedding the following Friday. He confiscates Lev and Kolya's ration cards and sends them off with a letter saying they shouldn't be stopped or harassed.

Lev and Kolya try to purchase eggs at a black market, where a large man offers to sell them eggs from his apartment. At the apartment, Lev and Kolya discover corpses and realize that the giant and the giant’s wife are cannibals. Lev and Kolya narrowly manage to escape unscathed. Kolya and Lev spend the night at the apartment of Kolya's friend, Sonya, who lives with several young doctors. Lev sleeps that night in the living room and hears Kolya and Sonya have sex in the next room.

The following morning, Lev and Kolya investigate a rumor of an old man keeping chickens on a roof. They discover the corpse of the old man, and the old man's grandson near death but still guarding one remaining chicken. The child initially refuses Lev and Kolya's offers of help but finally offers them the last chicken he'd been keeping warm under his coat. They take the chicken back to Sonya's in the hopes it will lay eggs in time, until one of the doctors returns to Sonya's apartment and incredulously explains to the others that the chicken is actually a rooster.

Kolya wakes Lev the next morning and informs him they're going to walk to Mga, the site of a poultry collective. As they walk, Kolya shares more about The Courtyard Hound and they discuss Lev's father, a famous writer who was killed by the NKVD. As night falls, Kolya admits they're going the wrong way. Lev notices a farmhouse with lit windows, and inside they see four teenage girls dancing. Kolya knocks on the door and has a short standoff with one of the girls, and Lev finally realizes that the girls are being kept by the Germans as sex slaves. Lev and Kolya make peace with the the girls, who offer them food and share that the soldiers who visit them are Einsatzgruppen (Nazi death squads).

When Kolya asks the girls why they haven't fled, they are told of a young girl favored by the Germans who tried run away, but was caught, tortured, and murdered by Abendroth, the Einsatzgruppen officer in charge. Lev and Kolya decide to try to kill the Nazis when they come later that night. The Nazis arrive earlier than expected, but are ambushed by Russian partisan fighters outside. The partisans almost shoot Lev and Kolya as well, until Lev and Kolya prove they are Russian. Lev intrigued to find that the partisans' best sniper, Vika, is a girl.

The girls head south and Lev and Kolya follow the partisans to hunt Abendroth. As they walk, Kolya tells Lev more about The Courtyard Hound and Lev realizes the is actually Kolya's own work in progress. They soon come across villages that the Einsatzgruppen are burning and head for a nearby safe house to sleep. While everyone is sleeping, Kolya explains to Lev that he was actually accused of desertion because he spent New Year's Eve trying to find a woman in Leningrad to have sex with, but he grossly miscalculated how much time he had to get back to his squad.

The next morning, the Germans find the group. They all try to run and manage to hide but one of the partisans is killed. Vika decides they should infiltrate the group of prisoners with the Germans, and are successful, but the partisan leader Markov is recognized by a prisoner he once robbed and is killed by the Germans.

When the company reaches a schoolhouse, an Einsatzgruppen officer tests the prisoners' literacy. Lev, Kolya, and Vika all pretend to be illiterate. All the literate prisoners are shot. The following morning, they discover that the prisoner who betrayed Markov has been murdered in the night. As they march that day, Kolya suggests that Vika certainly killed the man, and is likely NKVD. A convoy of German vehicles passes the prisoners, and Vika points out Abendroth's car at the end of the convoy and Kolya, who speaks German, approaches a group of soldiers and begins to banter with them. When he returns to Lev and Vika, he suggests Lev challenge Abendroth to a chess match.

That night, Abendroth calls for Lev, Vika, and Kolya. He sees through their ruse, stating that Lev is a Jew, Vika is female, and they're all certainly literate. He finally agrees to a chess match and adds a dozen eggs to wager at Kolya's request. The three are searched but the young soldier who searches them misses their hidden knives. Lev wins the chess game against Abendroth, and takes the opportunity to stab Abendroth. He kills Abendroth and a soldier fighting Kolya, losing his left index finger in the process. Vika grabs the Germans' guns, Kolya grabs the box of eggs, and the three jump out the window and run for the woods.

When Leningrad is in sight, Vika asks Lev for his full name so she can find him later, kisses him, and leaves to find another group of partisans. When Lev and Kolya reach the defenses of Leningrad the next morning, the soldiers on duty shoot at them and hit Kolya in one of his buttocks. When the lieutenant realizes that Kolya and Lev are working for Colonel Grechko, he loads Kolya and Lev into a truck and heads quickly for the hospital, afraid of making a powerful enemy. Kolya is incensed at having been shot by his own people but tries to tell Lev that everything's going to be fine. As Kolya's lips turn blue, it becomes obvious that Kolya is going to die. He smiles at Lev and Lev wishes he could make a joke. Lev delivers the eggs to Colonel Grechko later that morning and discovers that Grechko has already procured three dozen other eggs.

The German siege is lifted in January of 1944. In 1945, Lev is in his apartment reading when he hears a knock at the door. He answers it, and Vika is standing in the hallway with her suitcase and a dozen eggs. Lev suggests they make an omelet, and Vika states that she doesn't cook.

Reception

The book was well received by most critics, including Jesse Berrett of SFGate and Boris Fishman of The New York Times. According to Jennifer Reese of Entertainment Weekly, "Benioff has produced a funny, sad, and thrilling novel. A-". However, Donna Rifkind of Los Angeles Times wrote that while the book "features a snappy plot, a buoyant friendship, a quirky courtship, an assortment of menacing bad guys, an atmosphere that flickers between grainy realism and fairy-tale grotesquerie and a grim but irrepressible sense of humor," it left her "thoroughly and discouragingly unmoved."

The novel was also a major artistic inspiration for the post-apocalyptic video game The Last of Us. The game's director Bruce Straley said: "It's nice to be inspired by [...] the right things. City of Thieves is an amazing book. Everybody should check that out." The book makes an appearance in the sequel, The Last of Us Part II, where the character Abby is seen reading the book. Abby, later in the game, meets a boy named Lev, who then becomes a major protagonist in her narrative arc.