Rating: 
Summary: brrrrrrrrrrrr
Review: Forget the Spy Who Came In From the Cold, meet the spy who went out into the cold, the really, really cold. When a Russian scientist, working at a mysterious research station in Siberia, manages to get a cryptic message to the West, it is determined that he's summoning Dr. Johnny Porter, a part Gitksan Indian, Rhodes Scholar, anthropologist, who speaks any number of languages. The two had met many years earlier, and out of a sense of obligation, Porter agrees to sneak into the installation and find out what's so important. What follows is one of the better thrillers of the post Cold War era, as Porter impersonating various people of Asiatic descent, while displaying extraordinary resourcefulness at myriad tasks, penetrates deep into Russian territory and then, pursued by all of the forces of the new Russia, strikes out across the icy barrens of the Kolymsky Region of Siberia and the area around the Bering Straits, in a mad dash back to the States.The case of Lionel Davidson is one of the strangest of any recent author. He writes award-winning, best sellers every few years, but I doubt more than a handful of folks remember him from one book to the next. In Kolymsky Heights, he combines elements of Michael Crichton, Smilla's Sense of Snow, and Martin Cruz Smith's Arkady Renko series to produce a novel that's exciting enough in it's own right but is even more remarkable for it's unusual hero and for the way that Davidson uses the hostile environment, both natural and man-made. Though a general and helicopters and Russian troops all pursue him, the real threat to Porter is the forbidding terrain he has to cross and the deadly weather he braves. This is one that you'll want to read with a blanket over you and a warm mug of something or other nearby. GRADE : A
Rating: 
Summary: a reasonbly entertaining read
Review: I bought this based on the brothersjudd review below. It was good, and it was a page turner, but I kept waiting for something to happen, and it kind of didn't. The big secret wasn't really super exciting, nor were the individual elements. It would be good airplane reading, however it's not the intellectual thriller that I would have liked. I'd look carefully before I bought another of Davidson's books, but it's not out of the question.
Rating:
Summary: Not your average spy book.
Review: I'd like to think this is the kind of spy book Umberto Eco would write. Well-researched, plausible plot. This is not James Bond. Instead, the reader is draw into a facinating puzzle: how does somebody sneak into a top secret military base in Siberia? And, how do you get out? Johnny Porter is an unforgetable character and the scenery and action is crisply told. I'm looking forward to Davidson's other books
Rating:
Summary: excellent thriller non-traditional hero
Review: Imagine an indian, intellectual, language specialist, anthropologist sent on a mission to infiltrate on contact the head of trhe most secure facility in the world - frozen Siberia. I was fortunate to find this book on a discount rack for $2.97. I took a small chance was pleasantly surprised with the quality of Davidsons writing. The story is inteligent, rich with detail, thrilling and beleivable carried out by an action hero who coulc never be played by Arnold S in a movie version. He is real guy a beleiveable guy in an incredible situation where he has to rely on his intelligence and wits to survive. Bravo Davidson and I will look forward to reading more exploits of Porter. Tell me where I can find info on that fabulous Bobik!
Rating: 
Summary: Well written, interesting spy-type thriller
Review: Johnny Porter may not be James Bond, but he's cut from the same cloth. He's a professor of languages with a flair for picking up new ones and on top of that he's a Canadian indian. When a top-secret Siberian installation must be infiltrated the only one who can do so is one who looks and talks like a native, and who has enough knowledge to understand what he's going to see. Johnny Porter is the man chosen for the job. I found this book very interesting. Johnny Porter is a complex character who never takes anything for granted. This book leads you through the planning for the infiltration, the infiltration itself, and the escape. It's meticulously done from start to finish, and most of it is very believable. But it's not a dry book by any means. Porter and the other characters come alive in the book. My only problem was with the big secret that Porter is supposed to bring out of the installation. It seemed a bit less than earth-shaking. I'd recommend this book. Davidson is head-and-shoulders above many of the spy/thriller writers writing today.
Rating:
Summary: Well written, interesting spy-type thriller
Review: Johnny Porter may not be James Bond, but he's cut from the same cloth. He's a professor of languages with a flair for picking up new ones and on top of that he's a Canadian indian. When a top-secret Siberian installation must be infiltrated the only one who can do so is one who looks and talks like a native, and who has enough knowledge to understand what he's going to see. Johnny Porter is the man chosen for the job. I found this book very interesting. Johnny Porter is a complex character who never takes anything for granted. This book leads you through the planning for the infiltration, the infiltration itself, and the escape. It's meticulously done from start to finish, and most of it is very believable. But it's not a dry book by any means. Porter and the other characters come alive in the book. My only problem was with the big secret that Porter is supposed to bring out of the installation. It seemed a bit less than earth-shaking. I'd recommend this book. Davidson is head-and-shoulders above many of the spy/thriller writers writing today.
Rating:
Summary: Haunting Story
Review: This book stayed with me long after I finished it. The plot and characters were compelling--the kind of story you rearrange your daily routine for a few days to keep reading. The ending was terrific. As soon as I finished it, I ordered all his previous works.
Rating:
Summary: Well constructed thriller
Review: This is a very good book to read and is full of suspense there are times when the story line seems to wonder but all in all i would recomend this.
Rating:
Summary: Top 1%
Review: This is quite possibly the lamest book I have ever read in the cold-war thriller genre. Implausible plot devices, impossible heroics (the shot "leaves his eye on the floor," yet our stalwart hero trudges on at one point), and a prose style that makes two week old lasagna seem fresh. No motivation is ever developed for a rude and reticent lead character (with the prerequisite pot boiler characteristics of hyper-academic intelligence, animalistic backwoods savvy, inexhaustible macgyver-like creativity and, oh yes, an irresistible charm to women to abandon his mountain man idyll and become siberia's own Rambo, save for the notion that a 5 page book about a hero who tells the authorities to get lost may not have made the most ordinary of books. As this is, and oh that it had been released in the five page version.
Rating: 
Summary: What is the sound of a yawn? (Insert here)
Review: This story didn't work very well for me. It was excrutiatingly slow getting out of the blocks, became mildly interesting about one third of the way along, and then bogged down again. Then, it seemed the author decided to insert a most-unlikely love angle, after which, one fortuitious happenstance after another occur. Then we are treated to the bumblingly inefficient Russian army (how convenient), and an overused, transparent ruse at the end. This is very tedious reading of the sort that makes a reader want to demand a refund, not so much, of their money, but rather of their time. Imagine this: A Russian officer referring to a military blunder as, "a cockup"! How much more British could that dialog be, for Christ's sake!
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