Twenty years after a devastating nuclear war, the inhabitants of Moscow have only survived by fleeing deep into the metro. But the future of humanity is threatened when a new race of mutants known as the “Dark Ones” start to attack the station-towns on the fringes of the metro.

This is where our story begins, twenty years have passed and many have never seen the outside world. Artyom, our main character, sets out with an urgent message that he must deliver to Polis Station, the closest thing to a city in the underground. From here, the plot takes a back seat, the story revolving much more around the world and journey to Polis. Through Artyom’s perspective we explore the recesses of the metro and the beliefs of its various inhabitants. A new Nazi Reich, communist revolutionaries, a secret order of adventurers that loot the libraries on the surface, and mystic Gurus all inhabit the last refuge of mankind.

 The world is built expertly with strong descriptions and excellent characters, portraying a dark and dirty place devoid of resources, where life is cheap and everything else is expensive. People are corralled into stations, farming mushrooms and pigs in an effort to survive. Most sleep in army tents or on the tracks and electricity is rationed or isn’t used at all. Bullets have long since replaced money and are used to buy and sell. Some governments have popped up, but most places are independent or lawless. The whole metro is portrayed as hopeless, a tomb for the living that Artyom must navigate on his journey to save mankind from the mutants.

Not to say the book is perfect. Artyom, our protagonist, is rather bland and acts more as a vessel through which we experience his world of the story (though he is much better written in the sequels). The plot is also lackluster. The dark ones and their story ends with a whimper and the whole ending seems rushed. A very annoying issue I found is that the characters give directions through the winding tunnels of the metro, but we have no map or way of visualizing these directions short of looking up schematics of the actual Muscovite Metro. These issues are minor, though, and the strong world makes up for this. The sequel, 2034, suffers more from these problems and does little to build on the foundations laid by the previous books. 2035, the last book, fixes most of these things, greatly improving character development, world-building, and plot, making for a much better read. I recommend skipping 2034 and going straight to 2035, as nothing of importance carries over from the botched sequel to the finale, only a few characters.  

Metro 2033 was also turned into a video game, which I would recommend for all the same reasons I recommended the book, that being its world and attention to detail. Also, like the books, the sequel greatly improves on the faults of the original.

Metro 2033 is a 3.5/5, worth reading once, though 2035 is a 4/5, definitely a great book. Read 2034 at your own discretion, and if you gave up on the series after 2034 then try the final book out, instead.