Kate Gallison

CHERNOBYL MURDERS, Recent Chicago Tribune Review: Crime Scene by Paul Goat Allen

Aficionados of Cold War thrillers from writers like John le Carré, Tom Clancy and Len Deighton are in for a treat—and it comes courtesy of Chicago native Michael Beres.

Revolving around the events of April 26, 1986 when a reactor at a Ukrainian nuclear power plant exploded and released massive amounts of radioactivity into the surrounding area, "Chernobyl Murders" is equal parts spy thriller, murder mystery, ecological cautionary tale and, surprisingly enough, compelling love story. Powered by Ludlumesque pacing and meticulously detailed plotlines (Beres worked for the Atomic Energy Commission in the '60s and '70s), the story largely follows two characters: Kiev militia detective Lazlo Horvath and Juli Popovics, a technician at the Chernobyl plant.

After Horvath's brother—an engineer at the power plant—dies in the blast, he and his brother's pregnant mistress (Popovics) become scapegoats for a ruthless KGB major who has vowed to pin the disaster on them and further his political aspirations in the process.

So with the Soviet Union in political disarray and hundreds of thousands of displaced people creating chaos in the region, the unlikely pair must somehow find a way to survive and get the truth out—or become tagged some of history's most infamous villains.

"Chernobyl Murders" is a page-turner of the highest order: from the compelling characterization to the vividly described landscape of a devastated Ukraine to the stunning cover art, Beres has penned himself a winner.

Michael's experiences during the Cold War and his interest in the environment have shaped his novels. With degrees in computer science, math, and literature, he worked for the government, holding a top-secret security clearance, and in the private sector, documenting analytical software. His fiction reflects our age of environmental uncertainty and political treachery.

A Canadian publisher published Michael's first novel Sunstrike in the eighties when environmental and political conspiracies were considered tall tales. Today we know differently. Medallion Press published Michael's environmental novel Grand Traverse in 2005. It presents a realistic portrait of our frightening near future. His 2006 release, political thriller The President's Nemesis, was compared to The Manchurian Candidate by Library Journal and dubbed "a nail-biting thriller" by Midwest Review. Final Stroke (2007) is about health care scams, a detective who's had a stroke, and a plot to steal a Presidential election. Chernobyl Murders, coming in 2008, is an international thriller.

A Chicago native now living in West Michigan, Michael is a member of the Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, and the Sierra Club. He has driven a low-emissions hybrid vehicle since the beginning of the technology. His short stories have appeared in: Amazing Stories, Amazon Shorts, the American Fiction Collection, Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, Ascent, Cosmopolitan, Ellery Queen, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Missouri Review, New York Stories, Papyrus, Playboy, Pulpsmith, Skylark, and Twilight Zone.