Presented with an unexpected assignment, Alex Rider's greatest nemesis, Yassen Gregoravich, recalls his life and the path that led him to become an assassin while his one-time friend, Alex's uncle, became a spy.

In this remarkable novel, which spans eighty years of the twentieth century, Andreï Makine describes, beautifully but unsparingly, the almost uninterrupted succession of violence, misery, and horror that has been visited on the Russian people since the October Revolution of 1917. For those quick to forget, or too young to remember, he paints a graphic portrait of those years in a three-generational novel that is as moving as it is revealing. A young...

Presented with an unexpected assignment, Alex Rider's greatest nemesis, Yassen Gregoravich, recalls his life and the path that led him to become an assassin while his one-time friend, Alex's uncle, became a spy.

"A highly original narrative history by The Economist’s Moscow bureau chief that does for modern Russia what Evan Osnos did for China in Age of Ambition,"--Amazon.com.

"In the West's collective imagination, Vladimir Putin is a devious cartoon villain, constantly plotting and scheming to destroy his enemies around the globe and in Ukraine. But how did an undistinguished mid-level KGB officer become one of the most powerful leaders in Russian history? And how much of Putin's tough-guy persona is a calculated performance? In Accidental Czar, Andrew S. Weiss, a former White House Russia expert, and Brian "Box" Brown...

"Darryl Cunningham (Billionaires) returns with the riveting life story of Vladimir Putin, Russia's infamous autocrat. He traces Putin's development from schoolyard thug in Soviet-era Leningrad, to KGB officer, to corrupt commodities dealer, all the way to his presidency and beyond. In this educational and frank biography, Putin's journey is characterized by shifting loyalties, brutal treatment of detractors, and lawless financial dealings. Despite...

"The book provides fundamental information about the origins, evolution, and current affairs of the Russian state and society. The story begins with Russia's geographic endowment, proceeds through its experiences as a kingdom and empire, and continues through the USSR's three-quarters of a century, and finally the shocking breakup of that regime a generation ago. Chapters on the failed attempt to reform Communism under Mikhail Gorbachev, the halting...

"Charting the transformation of Vladimir Putin from a passionate fan of the West and a liberal reformer into a hurt and introverted outcast, All the Kremlin's Men is a historical detective story, full of intrigue and conspiracy. This is the story of the political battles that have taken place in the court of Vladimir Putin since his rise to power, and a chronicle of friendship and hatred between the Russian leader and his foreign partners and opponents....