Heads You Win

September 3, 2018
In Archer’s clever novel, a Sliding Doors-ish bildungsroman, fate hinges on the toss of a coin. After his father is assassinated by the KGB in 1968, young Alexander Karpenko says goodbye to his friend Vladimir and flees Russia with his mother. At the docks, they flip a coin to see if they will emigrate to London or New York. In one version of the story, Sasha and his mother journey to London, where he grows up to attend Cambridge, stands for Labour MP, marries well, and becomes involved in political hugger-mugger. In the other version of the story, Karpenko, here referred to as Alex, and his mother move to New York, where he grows up to be a hustler/entrepreneur, marries well, is named the chairman of a bank, and becomes involved in financial- and art-world chicanery. After 30 years, both Sasha and Alex return to Russia to find that their fates are now inextricably linked with the future of their post-Communist homeland. Archer cannibalizes his greatest hits (including Kane and Abel and First Among Equals) even as he emulates the ’60s bestsellers of Harold Robbins and Jacqueline Susann to tell his twinned stories of immigrant striving, romance, and dirty dealing, with a surprise last-sentence kicker that points to the present political moment. The result is a fun, fast-paced novel. 300,000-copy announced first printing.

Starred review from September 1, 2018
In the late 1960s, long before the fall of communism, a boy and his mother escape from Leningrad. They can stow away on either of two ships: one headed to England, the other to the U.S. They make their decision by flipping a coin. In this brilliantly conceived novel, Archer follows the lives of Alexander and Elena down both paths; in (mostly) alternating chapters, we see Alex build a financial empire in the U.S., while Sasha?a common Russian diminutive for Alexander?climbs the political ladder in England. Their lives follow generally parallel trajectories; a major event in Alex's life is roughly mirrored in Sasha's, and vice versa. Archer, no stranger to sprawling epics, covers three decades in the life of Alex/Sasha, working his way to a stunning conclusion that packs an emotional wallop. Typical for an Archer novel, the writing and characterizations are superb, and the book features several plot twists that send the story lines off in surprising new directions. There are a couple of moments, late in the novel, that should make readers' jaws drop?moments so unexpected and surreal that they require a second reading, just to make sure we really just read what we think we did. A splendid novel, featuring one of Archer's most elegantly told stories.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

June 15, 2018

In 1968, after his father is assassinated by the KGB, Russian teenager Alexander Karpenko flips a coin to decide whether he and his mother should immigrate (desperately) to London or to New York. Readers get two versions of what might have happened, depending on that flip. Major promotion.

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