A Ukrainian Mobster’s Confession

“Chapter 1: The Setup” begins with too long of a digression about drinking tea, and relaxing. On the second page, he gets to the point, he sees a photo of a guy he knows, but he is called in the paper “the Most Terrible Mafia King in Ukraine”. Then, another long digression: he is staring at the photo and pondering about his “mood” (5). He abstractly contemplates leaving, before explaining what exactly he was doing while he was “in”. He reads a newspaper article that summarizes the case: “hard racketeering, kidnapping, arms trafficking, threats, physical violence and contract killings” (6). Previous attempts to convict him failed because “corrupt connections in law enforcement agencies” got him to “avoid punishment”. “Finally, in 1998, Samvel went to jail for 14 years, but was released ahead of schedule and went back to his old ways.” He was re-arrested in 2019. The point that surprises the confessor is that he had “known” Samvel, but they “had neither taken nor sold drugs” (7). The writing style takes on a Dostoevsky quality as the narrator describes characters in this world. Then, he becomes digressive again as he ponders emptily how this arrest will affect him. Then, he mentions something that wasn’t apparent from the blurb: he has been working for this mobster for 25 years. And he’s been writing “popular novels” that described this guy? What? All businessmen in Donetsk were paying “dues” to Samvel. Then, the narrator introduces his own extensive article that summarizes Samvel in a way that newspapers had not previously dared to do it. It includes details such as that his early release cost him $180,000, and there were many other releases over the decades. And during court proceedings, “unidentified individuals opened fire on the court, using a machine gun” (10-2).
In the second chapter, he goes back in time to report that life in the USSR was idyllic: intellectually-minded, with a pre-determined career path, and room for ambitions such as book-writing. He joined the army after college: a brutal experience. Then, he became an economist for the state. Then, the USSR began falling apart, and caused extreme inflation. Bribery was necessary to convince a director of a factory to let him “set up our ad hoc business to extract copper wire from old electric motors with a single piece of equipment: a blowtorch.” Then, one of them stole all the copper (19). Then, he gets in an illegal wood scheme. After many other corrupt actions, he ends up meeting Samvel. His brother needs money to get Samvel out of prison (64). While the first couple dozen pages are clear, and crisp, the narrative becomes much less detailed later, when Samvel is mentioned more and more. It seems obvious that the narrator is omitting some truths from his true story. Were there drugs? Was he helping with some of the murderers? The lack of specificity, and the focus on empty chatter hints something ominous is missing. I have to leave this story here. This guy is working pretty hard to make himself sympathetic, and its commendable that he’s confessing about anything. But making money from a confession after a life in the mob echoes Mob Wives, as opposed to anything heroic.
—Pennsylvania Literary Journal, Fall 2024: https://anaphoraliterary.com/journals/plj/plj-excerpts/book-reviews-fall-2024

I had high hopes for this book. Obviously, Ukraine is forefront in the news currently. I recall, before the current Russian invasion, the news stories about the corruption in the Ukrainian government, and the involvement of the Ukrainian Mafia. The author found himself sucked into the tentacles of the Mafia. Same old story, repeated so many times, a businessman accepts a deal "too good to be true" and then finds themselves owing a never ending debt to the mob. While I feel sorry for the author, honestly he should have known better. I didn't really enjoy the author's story, nor his writing. It seemed plodding, at best.

I appreciated Sergey Maidukov sharing their story with the reader. This was a fascinating read, it had that element that I was looking for and thought it worked as a memoir. I thought it was a unique look at the Ukrainian Mafia. It was written well and was an engaging story being told. I thought everything was what I wanted and glad this shed some light on this.