My friend Andrew Valerievitch Skorobogatov, from Yekaterinburg, Russia, sent me a message, citing a review on Amazon.com . . . some idiot posted the following review of Dostoevsky's "Crime and Punishment".
"You, Mr. Dostoevsky, a writer, certainly promising, and I've heard about you, a lot of good reviews. But if you want to succeed with an American audience, my advice:
(1) Call your heroes something simpler, as their names can not be completed, remembered or pronounced;
(2) The plot could be made livelier, you have many pages of lengthy discussions and all kinds of philosophy, they have to flip through, making your novel lose much from the rest of the detective novels;
(3) It is not necessary to limit the scope of the plot such exotic places as St. Petersburg, Russia: the reader will find it much easier if you move the action of your next book in a more familiar place and time. "

Granted, there are sure to be a lot of Americans who have no idea why this is so funny, but I trust that most my friends who read it will understand!