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3.85 AVERAGE
3.85 AVERAGE
challenging
informative
slow-paced
A really interesting and important book with moments of insight, but I didn’t find it well written, and I wished Putin had been more of a central nucleus - he gets lost in the sea of names and details that distract from the core of the story,
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
Not a fully fledged biography, but sobering and informative journalism, nonetheless.
So fascinating! Gessen does a great job of including enough background history to provide context but avoids bogging down the story with unnecessary info. This is an area I've been woefully ignorant in but I now feel like I have a better understanding of the situation in Russia and what is truly at stake with the recent connections between them and the US. Truly chilling!
3.5 stars
This is an excellent review - you should read it instead of whatever scattered thoughts I have.
This was a fairly 4 star read up until the Epilogue. Masha Gessen is clearly the heroine of this narrative but she kicks it up a notch at the end. Not really a biography, not really a history, but also not entirely her story, this book somehow falls somewhere within the three. Still, fairly engaging and interesting.
This is an excellent review - you should read it instead of whatever scattered thoughts I have.
This was a fairly 4 star read up until the Epilogue. Masha Gessen is clearly the heroine of this narrative but she kicks it up a notch at the end. Not really a biography, not really a history, but also not entirely her story, this book somehow falls somewhere within the three. Still, fairly engaging and interesting.
Masha Gessen is the perfect person to write this account of how our pres elect's best frenemy rose to power. She lays out some of his most egregious instances of corruption and willful disregard for Russian lives in his climb to the top. It's a wild upsetting book, but well worth the number of times you'll throw it down in disgust.
Somewhat disappointing book that didn't really address the main question: how did Putin come to power? The book is mostly about various examples of power abuse in Russia in which Putin supposedly played a decisive role.
I know nothing about Russia, really very little. After reading this book, I'm realising that I knew even less than I thought. It's just so... different.
The book itself is very well-written - easy to follow, and it chugs along at pace. I didn't get bored, nor did I get lost or confused which is always a possibility when reading about the unfamiliar. I do think the back-of-the-book classification of this as a biography is a bit misleading, however. It's much more the exploration of the political strategies and environment that have grown up around one person, rather than an in-depth study of that one person's life.
The author's portrait of Putin is certainly a disturbing one. Not so much the man himself, although he doesn't come off well here (and that is an understatement) but the society that exists around him. If even a fraction of this book is true - and it seems well-researched, especially the second half - then there is an enormous population of people on the other side of the world who are prepared to put up with an awful lot from their politicians. I mean really a despicable amount. That is just completely alien to me, and suddenly I feel a bit extra glad to live where I do.
I am interested in reading more about the chess player Kasparov, though. From what Gessen says his political efforts didn't much pan out, but he seems to have an interesting mind.
The book itself is very well-written - easy to follow, and it chugs along at pace. I didn't get bored, nor did I get lost or confused which is always a possibility when reading about the unfamiliar. I do think the back-of-the-book classification of this as a biography is a bit misleading, however. It's much more the exploration of the political strategies and environment that have grown up around one person, rather than an in-depth study of that one person's life.
The author's portrait of Putin is certainly a disturbing one. Not so much the man himself, although he doesn't come off well here (and that is an understatement) but the society that exists around him. If even a fraction of this book is true - and it seems well-researched, especially the second half - then there is an enormous population of people on the other side of the world who are prepared to put up with an awful lot from their politicians. I mean really a despicable amount. That is just completely alien to me, and suddenly I feel a bit extra glad to live where I do.
I am interested in reading more about the chess player Kasparov, though. From what Gessen says his political efforts didn't much pan out, but he seems to have an interesting mind.
wow... so much I had no idea about and so much I learned... and so much to think about... Really excellent and would recommend to anyone interested in our current history and where we're all headed on this tiny little planet we all call home...