Patrick Radden Keefe’s London Falling presents a narrative that begins as a mystery but evolves into a poignant tragedy.
April 17, 2026, 2:30 PM
An up-close view of the Riverwalk apartment building is captured as ominous gray clouds gather in the background.
Riverwalk, a luxurious apartment complex overlooking the Thames, is depicted in London on June 1, 2015.
One of the most disheartening experiences for a journalist is when a story reveals itself to be less compelling than initially anticipated. A surge in fatalities may have a mundane statistical explanation, an enticing narrative could be merely an inflated rumor, or a source might prove to be more self-aggrandizing than truthful.
Keefe, whose 2018 publication Say Nothing catapulted him into the realm of celebrity journalism, is an accomplished writer and reporter. He has crafted a highly engaging book from material that, I suspect, did not unfold as he had envisioned. His latest work, London Falling (expanded from a 2024 piece in The New Yorker), opens with the mysterious death of a teenager, seemingly linked to a web of money laundering, Russian finances, and international crime. The initial sections of the book read like a gripping thriller. However, the narrative that ultimately emerges is more somber and personal than the mystery initially suggested, and it is one that is not primarily centered in London.
In 2019, a London teenager named Zac Brettler tragically jumped to his death from the fifth floor of Riverwalk, a glamorous apartment building overlooking the Thames. In a striking coincidence, his fall was captured by a surveillance camera located on the opposite bank, at the headquarters of MI6, the British equivalent of the CIA.
The circumstances surrounding Brettler’s death raised immediate suspicions. The 19-year-old had become entangled with two older men: Akbar Shamji, then 47, and Verinder Sharma, who was in his fifties. Both men had been present in the apartment from which he leaped that fateful night. Brettler had informed his parents that he was engaging in high-stakes dealings among London’s elite, negotiating with Russian oligarchs for apartment purchases and investing in mining ventures in Kazakhstan. Shamji referred to Brettler as „Zac Ismailov,“ a young man who claimed to be the disinherited son of a Russian billionaire.
London is notorious for harboring illicit wealth, and Keefe adeptly illustrates the world of the Russian elite, who, following the Cold War, discovered that British authorities were more than willing to assist them in transferring their ill-gotten gains into the West. While the United Kingdom maintains a relatively clean image, London’s professionals—bankers, lawyers, brokers, and real estate agents—have profited immensely from wealth siphoned from corruption elsewhere. The city provided convenient legal fictions, such as the “non-domiciled” status, allowing foreigners to reside there without incurring tax obligations, and a legal framework that aggressively favored libel tourism for those eager to suppress investigations into their fortunes. It is suggested that British law enforcement may have even turned a blind eye to murders linked to Russian interests during the 2010s to maintain the status quo.
Unraveling the Truth Behind a Young Life
However, Brettler’s death was not a tale of grand international intrigue but rather one of mutual delusion and petty crime. An underperforming student, Brettler found himself at a London private school with a lenient admissions policy for the offspring of the affluent. His family belonged to the upper-class Jewish community in London, with a father in finance and a mother in journalism; they were well-off but not at the same echelon as some of his classmates, many of whom were children of Russian oligarchs.
Brettler became a habitual fantasist, claiming sexual, social, and financial triumphs that far exceeded reality. His peers were more skeptical of his assertions than some adults, including his parents, who seemed to hope that their son had stumbled upon early success and believed a fabricated screenshot that suggested he had £850,000 in his bank account.
In truth, he was depleting an inheritance of approximately £18,000, “paying for Ubers and picking up the tab just often enough to seem credible,” and possibly engaging in minor drug dealing among his peers. By the time of his death, only £4 remained in his account. His claims of connections to wealth and power were mere fantasies, cobbled together from fragments of truth and casual acquaintances.
If Brettler had experienced a bit more fortune, this period might have been relegated to an embarrassing chapter to be glossed over or laughed about in adulthood. Instead, it led him into the orbit of Shamji and Sharma, two individuals with their own histories of boastful lies and aspirations of wealth.
Shamji was, as the British might say, a chancer, existing in that ambiguous space that encompasses both entrepreneurs and con artists. Sharma was a straightforward criminal, a petty thug known as Indian Dave. They appeared to have believed Brettler’s claims of affluence and subsequently grew angry when he failed to deliver promised funds. When faced with apparent threats of violence, Brettler seemingly attempted to escape by making a reckless leap into the river, only to strike his hip on the way down, transforming a perilous fall into a fatal one.
Consequently, the book gradually shifts from a thriller to an exploration of parental grief. Keefe developed a close relationship with Brettler’s parents, who grappled with the task of unraveling their son’s fabrications amidst a police force largely disinterested in delving deeper into the case. Sharma died by apparent suicide in December 2020, yet the Brettler family struggled for years to obtain details about his death, leading them to suspect a cover-up as part of a larger scheme. They understandably sought to imbue their child’s death with significance, rather than accept it as merely “three bullshit artists, selling air,” as his mother ultimately came to realize.
The Complexity of Grief and Illusion
Parental grief is always poignant, even when it concerns a child who may not be particularly sympathetic. Perhaps Zac would have matured into a better individual; many do. As it stands, he appears to be a young man who had every opportunity—loving parents, ample financial resources, and a good education—yet felt entitled to more. At one point, he even attempted to strangle his mother in a fit of rage, seemingly upset with his parents for not being wealthy enough.
Where the book falters is in its effort to draw broader conclusions about London itself. The discussions regarding London’s role as the “butler to the world,” as articulated by Oliver Bullough in his 2022 book, feel somewhat extraneous, as they seem to stem from an earlier draft of the narrative, prior to the mundane reality of Brettler’s fabrications being unveiled.
Brettler, Sharma, and Shamji were all braggarts attempting to emulate the wealth surrounding them, but this phenomenon is not confined to London. The world is replete with disillusioned individuals of all ages ensnared in dreams of lifestyles they cannot attain, particularly in the era of online influencers.
The Influence of Online Culture
Keefe briefly touches upon Brettler’s online presence, but only towards the conclusion of the book. These sections primarily rely on the deceased boy’s web searches rather than his app usage, which, by 2019, had become the primary means through which a thoughtless 19-year-old engaged with the internet. With platforms like TikTok and YouTube, millions of teenage boys have convinced themselves that they, too, should be driving luxury cars and residing in multimillion-dollar apartments.
Another city looms over these delusions: Dubai, rather than London, serves as the global hub for those who seek to indulge the resentful fantasies of young men. More than London, it offers superficial allure and a welcoming environment for global wealth, alongside an exploitable underclass of workers to sustain those dreams. Many of these influencers are just as fraudulent as Sharma and Shamji, living in cramped quarters in Dubai while renting luxury vehicles for the day. It is telling that when Brettler envisioned an alternate life for himself, he claimed his mother resided in Dubai, not London.
Generational Stories of Struggle and Resilience
Yet, another narrative of London emerges within this book—one that recounts the journeys of previous generations, their struggles, successes, and the pain they endured in the capital. Keefe traces the histories of Shamji’s father, Abdul, and Brettler’s grandfather, the esteemed rabbi and media figure Hugo Gryn. Both men arrived in London as refugees from traumatic circumstances abroad: Gryn was a teenage survivor of Auschwitz, while Abdul Shamji was one of Uganda’s most prosperous businessmen before Idi Amin expelled the Asian community.
In England, both men carved out public careers for themselves, yet they also spun tales and lies. Gryn maintained a secret second family, while Shamji achieved success as an entrepreneur and a friend of Margaret Thatcher, only to see his empire collapse in scandal. The connection between Abdul Shamji’s deceptions and his son’s world of falsehoods is much more apparent than the link between Gryn, who passed away before his grandson was born, and Brettler.
However, these narratives of reinvention, illusion, and generational trauma serve as a reminder that London’s openness to the world has provided refuge for individuals, not merely wealth. The vast majority of immigrants who continue to flock to the city are not oligarchs or con artists, but rather individuals seeking a chance at a decent, hardworking life for themselves or their children—an opportunity that Brettler ultimately rejected.
Books are independently selected by editors. A commission is earned on purchases made through links to Amazon.com on this page.
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James Palmer serves as a deputy editor. Follow him on Bluesky: @beijingpalmer.bsky.social
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