Metro 2033 (book 1 of 3) by Dimitri Glukhovsy (book review)

‘Metro 2033’ by Dmitry Glukhovsky is a post-apocalyptic Science Fiction horror thriller set in the Moscow Metro system that will, hopefully, put Russians off the idea of having that big war. It was originally made available for free on the author’s website, became popular enough for mainstream publication in Russia and then went worldwide. There is a video game already and a film is in development. A stage play and a musical soon? Who knows? The reason for all this success is the usual one, it’s a great story.

The Moscow Metro system is an amazing feat of engineering and one of the wonders of the modern world. Some stations are palatial and many are magnificent. In 2033, the world has been reduced to rubble by nuclear war. A few thousand people survive in the Moscow Metro. They grow mushrooms and breed pigs and chickens, sending scavengers called stalkers to raid the surface for other things, braving radiation and a variety of deadly mutated creatures. Because the tunnels between platforms are dangerous, individual stations develop distinct cultures and traditions over the years, making them almost like separate countries. Only traders and stalkers travel much between them.

The story is told with a tight third-person point of view. Our hero is Artyom, twenty years old, who was born on the surface and still has vague memories of that happier life. His dying mother handed him over to a stranger named Sukhoi, now his stepfather. They live in VDNKh, the northernmost inhabited station on its line. A few years earlier, Artyom and some friends ventured to the Botanical Gardens and opened a hatch to the surface. When threatened by something strange and deadly, they ran and left it open. VDNKh is on guard because the unknown enemy, the dark ones, is slowly coming down the tunnels towards them. They seem to have some kind of psychic power which makes humans fear and despair even before they attack. Artyom is able to resist this better than most.

Hunter, a stalker and troubleshooter for the administration and a friend of Artyom’s stepfather, goes off to investigate the threat but says that if he doesn’t come back, Artyom must travel to the heart of the Metro system, find a stalker named Melnik and tell him the whole story. He doesn’t come back. Artyom sets off on his mission and we discover with him the varied and dangerous world of the Metro, meeting many strange, interesting and colourful characters along the way.

Artyom is an ordinary, decent bloke put in a difficult situation. He struggles. At the lowest point in his journey, he wanders through a dangerous tunnel unarmed, naked and covered in human excrement. From here, there’s nowhere to go but up. Hunter, Melnik and the other stalkers he meets are mentors and heroes, competent, battle-hardened veterans accustomed to danger. Other characters showcase a variety of political and religious ideas, mostly continuations of surface-world philosophies, with a few mad variations born of the underground, post-apocalyptic circumstances. The older people, who well remember life on the surface before the war, a life of decadent luxury compared to the Metro, are generally sad and angry about the mess humanity has made of things.

The characters talk at great length, telling their stories and expounding their ideas in a way that is unusual in Western thriller fiction and slows the action down. However, if you want action alone, there are plenty of adventure books to supply that need and I enjoyed the added depth this provided. There are also detailed descriptions of the layout, economics and physical appearance of Metro stations in dense prose, like books from the 19th century, almost Dickensian, long blocks of text that might repel the modern reader. Yet the book has attracted millions of them. Go figure.

I’m sure it will make a great action film because the surface story, the deeds, suit that medium well. Yet as with many other films, ‘Dune’, ‘Starship Troopers’, ‘The Godfather’ and ‘The Dirty Dozen’, those who read the book will get a lot more depth and insight. I enjoyed it hugely and the message is clear. Don’t have that nuclear war.

Eamonn Murphy

May 2026

(pub: Gollancz, 2011. 464 page paperback. Price: £ 8.99 (UK). ISBN:  978-0-57508-625-8))

check out website: https://x.com/gollancz/status/1950224368723804500