To avoid disappointment it is probably best not to expect a thriller or even a mystery with Snowdrops, which is odd because the setting (Shady goings-on in post-Soviet Russia) and the style (first person confessional) all seem to point in that direction. Instead it is more like a psychological sketch of a hollow, unloveable man, living in a hollow, unloveable age. It has some wonderfully observed descriptions of the harshness of a russian winter, and the story is full of frosty exchanges between people who seem to have forgotten how to care. There are only three warm characters in the book (three people who you would like to talk to and get to know) and interestingly they are all over sixty. But Miller doesn't let you get that close to these characters, because the story isn't really about them.