Kasvoton mies: Vladimir Putinin nousu Venäjän valtiaaksi by Masha Gessen

3.85 AVERAGE

wonder_kinder's review against another edition

2.0
I was looking for a biography, not a biased piece of anti-Putin propaganda and the level of the propaganda she rails so hard against.

joweston's review against another edition

3.0
Interesting and of course, pretty unnerving stuff, if true. Some of it feels very grounded in fact and sensible analysis of those facts. Other bits are just "he isn't nice so he must have done it", meaning specifically Putin, and not those many people who are around him.

However what is clear is that Putin is vile and self serving, as well as extraordinarily rich at great loss to his country, though I still don't know if he has personally ordered the murder of thousands or not.

ekholm's review against another edition

4.5
dark emotional
susani_'s profile picture

susani_'s review against another edition

2.0
This book had too much speculation in it for my liking. You could really tell that the author hates Vladimir Putin, which makes her fallible to placing her opinions as facts.

emmath's review against another edition

3.0
3.5
greglhoward's profile picture

greglhoward's review against another edition

3.0
It needs to be noted upfront that Gessen is an anti-Putin activist. So this book is hardly a narrative biography of Putin's life. In fact, if you're interested in his life story, Wikipedia might be a better place to learn about it. Rather this book outlines how horrible he is. Gessen is occasionally speculative about Putin's role in various atrocities, assassinations, or other nefarious dealings, but everything she accuses him of would be in line with his character, and there are plenty of incidents in which she has no need to speculate because it is abundantly clear he was involved. Reading through this book can be reflective as well, since many of these events happened as the Western world was looking at Putin with respect. Obviously, in this decade, views on Putin have changed to be more in line with his actions, but it is striking to note how different the world viewed him when many of these actions were taking place.

benhamm's review against another edition

5.0
challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad fast-paced

owen_z's review against another edition

3.0
post-Stalin Russian Putin

nwolkov's review against another edition

4.25
dark informative mysterious medium-paced

ida_s's review against another edition

4.0
Scary account of Russia's recent history. Important read. In no way neutral, but also doesn't claim to be.