Awards

• Long-listed for Samuel Johnson Prize 2012 (UK)
• Short-listed for Pushkin House Russian Book Prize 2013 (UK)

Overview

'A luminous study' Luke Harding, Guardian 'Courageous and shocking' Katy Guest, Books of the Year, Independent on Sunday How did a small-minded, low-level KGB operative come to control the world's largest country and, in an astonishingly short time, destroy years of progress, making Russia once more a threat to her own people and to the world? Masha Gessen shows that when Vladimir Putin, an unimportant, low-level KGB operative, was rushed to power by a group of Oligarchs in 1999, he was a man without a history. Yet within a few brief years, he had dismantled Russia's media, wrested control and wealth from the country's burgeoning business class, and decimated the fragile mechanisms of democracy. Virtually every opposing voice was silenced, with political rivals and critics driven into exile or to the grave. Drawing on information and sources no other writer has tapped, Masha Gessen's fearless account charts Putin's rise from the boy who had scrapped his way through post-war Leningrad schoolyards. Now the 'faceless' man who manoeuvred his way into absolute - and absolutely corrupt - power, has become a threat to the stability of the world, and this important book is more relevant than ever. Now with a new preface by the author. 'A clear, brave book... Gessen offers intriguing details of the scratching, biting, hair-tearing, undersized, brawling boy Putin, refusing to be bullied in the grubby back yards of Leningrad' James Meek, Observer 'Gessen's engaging prose combines a native's passion with a mordant wit and caustic understatement that are characteristically Russian' AD Miller, Daily Telegraph

Full Product Details

9781803510491

Table of Contents

Reviews

"A luminous study -- Luke Harding * Guardian * Courageous and shocking -- Katy Guest, Books of the Year * Independent on Sunday * Gessen fearlessly tells the story of the unlikely rise of Vladimir Putin * Big Issue in the North * A clear, brave book... Gessen offers intriguing details of the scratching, biting, hair-tearing, undersized, brawling boy Putin, refusing to be bullied in the grubby back yards of Leningrad -- James Meek * Observer * Gessen's engaging prose combines a native's passion with a mordant wit and caustic understatement that are characteristically Russian -- AD Miller * Daily Telegraph * Bold, detailed, and eloquent -- David Evans, Books of the Year * Independent on Sunday * Gessen conveys the atmosphere - whether of the last months of the Soviet Union, the chaotic years of Yeltsin, the strange transfer of the presidency to Putin or the disappointments of his period - more accurately than any recent chronicler of the period -- Mary Dejevsky * Independent * [A] courageous, enlightening account... Despite the suppression of the media and the murder of critics and political rivals, brave voices like Gessen's, and those before [them], have helped shed some much needed light on Putin's ""criminal tyranny"" -- Lucy Popescu * Independent on Sunday * A rivetingly combative biography... utterly chilling * Sunday Telepgraph * A compelling and exhaustive portrait * Telegraph * Brilliant -- Edward Lucas * Daily Mail * Gessen is a talented and versatile journalist -- John Lloyd * Financial Times * Gessen has written a brave book, demolishing the numerous myths and legends that have accumulated around [their] subject -- Luke Harding * Guardian * [A] fiercely critical biography -- Anita Singh * Telegraph * An astonishingly brave and eloquent book -- David Evans * Independent on Sunday *"

"A luminous study -- Luke Harding * Guardian * Courageous and shocking -- Katy Guest, Books of the Year * Independent on Sunday * Gessen fearlessly tells the story of the unlikely rise of Vladimir Putin * Big Issue in the North * A clear, brave book... Gessen offers intriguing details of the scratching, biting, hair-tearing, undersized, brawling boy Putin, refusing to be bullied in the grubby back yards of Leningrad -- James Meek * Observer * Gessen's engaging prose combines a native's passion with a mordant wit and caustic understatement that are characteristically Russian -- AD Miller * Daily Telegraph * Bold, detailed, and eloquent -- David Evans, Books of the Year * Independent on Sunday * Gessen conveys the atmosphere - whether of the last months of the Soviet Union, the chaotic years of Yeltsin, the strange transfer of the presidency to Putin or the disappointments of his period - more accurately than any recent chronicler of the period -- Mary Dejevsky * Independent * [A] courageous, enlightening account... Despite the suppression of the media and the murder of critics and political rivals, brave voices like Gessen's, and those before her, have helped shed some much needed light on Putin's ""criminal tyranny"" -- Lucy Popescu * Independent on Sunday * A rivetingly combative biography... utterly chilling * Sunday Telepgraph * A compelling and exhaustive portrait * Telegraph * Brilliant -- Edward Lucas * Daily Mail * Gessen is a talented and versatile journalist -- John Lloyd * Financial Times * Gessen has written a brave book, demolishing the numerous myths and legends that have accumulated around her subject -- Luke Harding * Guardian * [A] fiercely critical biography -- Anita Singh * Telegraph * An astonishingly brave and eloquent book -- David Evans * Independent on Sunday *"

Author Information

Masha Gessen is a staff writer at the New Yorker and the author of several books, among them the National Book Award-winning The Future is History and the Samuel Johnson prize-longlisted The Man Without a Face. The recipient of numerous other awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Carnegie Fellowship, Gessen lives in New York City.

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