Published 21 July 2026 · Available now on Amazon in Kindle and paperback
Olga Miksa rules Nevada’s most feared crime family on two buried secrets: a fortune in Romanov treasure smuggled out of Russia by her father, and an act of Cold War betrayal that bought the family’s immunity from East and West alike. When an old friend hands producer Marcus Riley a cryptic riddle and turns up dead outside LA’s most notorious pawn shop hours later, Marcus and Mako are pulled into the Miksas’ world.
Follow the story as Marcus and Mako dig into a labyrinth of mobsters, traitors and lethal loyalties built to protect a legacy that reaches back to the lost Tobolsk urns and the Eremin Letters, and forward to Stalin’s darkest secret. The deeper they dig, the higher the body count climbs, and the more they become the only people standing between the Miksas and a truth that could rewrite history.
Justice isn’t for sale here, but survival is the ultimate prize.
Sunset Circus by Mark Grenside is published by Sharpe Books.
www.sharpebooks.com
Where Truth Meets Fiction
Bibliography and References
Prologue
The Devastating True Story of the Romanov Family Execution by Simon Sebag Montefiore
Corps Commander
In 1918 the Red Army abandoned epaulettes and ranks and gave very generic terms.
Part One: Riddle Me This
Chapter 10
Three Hidden Jars and Their Guardians
Father Alexei Vasily
Pohod
A lethal hunting knife found in Russia and Northern Europe. It is often kept inside the boot
Chapter 13
Bratva – Nevada City’s Deep Connection to Russian Oligarchs by Loretta Splitair
The White Russian Cocktail
Created by Mokelumne Hill bartender, William Franks it to curry favor with the Bratva mob.
Chapter 14
Black Palm Cockatoo
Valued approximately between $15,000 and $25,000.
Chapter 15
The Siberian Village of Okunevo as a Place of Power and Its Sacred Landscape, Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics, Estonian Literary Museum, 2021
Tachanka The Oxford History of Modern War, by Charles Townsend
Chapter 20
Lost Tsarist Gold and Diamonds
Clues about lost Tsarist gold and diamonds worth an untold fortune. siberiantimes.com
Jewels of the Tsars: The Romanovs and Imperial Russia by Prince Michael of Greece
Chapter 22
1917 Constituent Assembly Election With a turnout of approximately 64% (45,879,381 voters), the Bolsheviks (later the Communist Party of Russia) received 23.3%, while the Socialist Revolutionaries Party secured 37.6%.
Romanov Assassination
The Bolsheviks kept the details of the Romanov family’s assassination secret until publicly acknowledging the murders in 1926.
Lapta
One of the oldest and most distinctly Russian outdoor games. It is a bat and ball game similar to cricket and baseball.
Chapter 25
Fiat Omsky vehicles Used by the White Army on the Eastern front.
Legend of Hanuman Temple near Okunevo
Part Two: One, Two, Buckle My Shoe
Chapter 33
Beretta Bobcat A semi-automatic pocket pistol produced by Beretta in Accokeek Maryland.
Okhrana
Autocracy Under Siege and The Watchful State by Jonathan Daly.
Chapter 37
Пахан (Pakhan)
Godfather, head of the Bratva. Russia Mafia: Organized Crime, The History Channel.
Chapter 38
The Office of Strategic Services (OSS)
The Intelligence Agency of the United States during World War II. It was dissolved a month after the end of hostilities and was succeeded by the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Chapter 47
UNDARK
Radioactive paint
Radium Girls
Radium Girls movie, Netflix.
The Radium Girls by Kate Moore (ISBN 1471153878)
en.wikipedia.org — Radium Girls
Chapter 48
PO BOX 1663 During World War II, this post office box in Santa Fe, New Mexico, served as the only mailing address for the entire secret community of Los Alamos, theconversation.com
Part Three: Both Sides of a Cloud
Chapter 49
Nevada Theater
Chapter 55
Operation Telemark
Hunting Hitler’s Nukes: The Secret Race to Stop the Nazi Bomb by Damien Lewis
Chapter 60
Use of Microfilm in US Libraries during World War II
ala.org
Chapter 61
The Last Payphone in New York City
Located at 7th and 50th Streets.
Chapter 68
Ruger LCR
Luminol
A water-based solution used to detect blood, even if diluted 10,000 times. When sprayed, it causes blood to fluoresce a pale blue color for a few moments. Best observed in a darkened room with specialist goggles.
What3words
A proprietary geocode system that identifies locations on earth with a resolution of about 3 meters. It is owned by What3words Limited, based in London, UK.
Chapter 69
The Pioneer Graveyard
The oldest cemetery in Nevada City, established in 1851 during the Gold Rush. Located on West Broad Street.
The Catalina Jail
Referenced in Fall Out, the first book about Marcus and Mako. A fictional high-end and discreet retreat for health treatments, facelifts, body sculpting, and medical treatments.
Chapter 74
The Cheka
Real-life torture and horror, state sanctioned.
The Sig Sauer P232 A highly compact .22 automatic sigsauer.com
Chapter 78
Venona Project
A highly secret counterintelligence program initiated during World War II by the SIS and later the NSA. Approximately 3,000 messages were decrypted and translated over a 37-year period.
Gene Grabeel, a female American mathematician and cryptanalyst, played a key role in the operation.
Chapter 89
The Eremin Letter
Captain A. Eremin.
Documentary Proof, by Eric Lee.
en.wikipedia.org — Eremin letter
Chapter 94
Atwater Penitentiary
Located in Merced, California, is a high-security federal prison.
Chapter 97
Vektor Pistol — The SR-1M
Commonly known as the Vektor, is a modern semi-automatic pistol chambering 9 x 21 mm rounds and common amongst Russian law enforcement and security forces.