From acclaimed historian and author of Kremlin Winter and Blood on the Snow, a dramatic and expertly researched account of an extraordinary moment in Russia’s recent history: the August Coup.In the summer of 1991, a group of eight plotters came together to overthrow Mikhail Gorbachëv, then the president of the USSR. These ruthless conspirators, who occupied positions of high office, declared a state of emergency to restore stability through author...

From acclaimed historian and author of Kremlin Winter and Blood on the Snow, a dramatic and expertly researched account of an extraordinary moment in Russia’s recent history: the August Coup.In the summer of 1991, a group of eight plotters came together to overthrow Mikhail Gorbachëv, then the president of the USSR. These ruthless conspirators, who occupied positions of high office, declared a state of emergency to restore stability through author...

The first comprehensive account to reveal exactly how the Cold War - and the Soviet Union - came to an end, a process which transformed the world in the late 20th century."Our leading historian of the Soviet Union ... magisterial" ObserverThe dismantling of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the spread of Perestroika throughout the former Soviet bloc was a sea change in world history and two years later resulted in the dissolution of the ...

Robert Service's The Penguin History of Modern Russia: From Tsarism to the Twenty-first Century provides a superb panorama of Russia in the modern age.Russia's recent past has encompassed revolution, civil war, mass terror and two world wars, and the country is still undergoing huge change.In his acclaimed history, now revised and updated with a new introduction and final chapter, Robert Service explores the complex, changing interaction between ru...

Drawing on a wealth of unexplored material - available for the first time since the collapse of the former Soviet Union - Robert Service's biography of Stalin is the most authoritative yet published. It concentrates not simply on Stalin as dedicated bureaucrat or serial political killer, but on a fuller assessment of his formative interactions in Georgia, his youthful revolutionary activism, his relationship with Lenin, with his family, and with his party members.'This is effec...

The critically acclaimed biography of Lenin by one of the greatest Russian history experts and bestselling author of Trotsky, Stalin and Comrades.Lenin is a colossal figure whose influence on twentieth-century history cannot be underestimated. Robert Service has written a calmly authoritative biography on this seemingly unknowable figure. Making use of recently opened archives, he has been able to piece t...

Revolutionary practitioner, theorist, factional chief, sparkling writer, 'ladies' man' (e.g., his affair with Frieda Kahlo), icon of the Revolution, anti-Jewish Jew, philosopher of everyday life, grand seigneur of his household, father and hunted victim, Trotsky lived a brilliant life in extraordinary times.Robert Service draws on hitherto unexamined archives and on his profound understanding of Russian history to draw a portrait of the man and his legacy, revealing that though his...

This popular, concise and highly readable study discusses the key themes and debates about the Russian Revolution. Robert Service's lively analysis examines:- state and society under the Romanovs from 1900- The February and October Revolutions of 1917- The final years of the Romanov dynasty and the start of the Soviet order- Comparisons with political, social and economic trends elsewhere in the world- The extent to which the later development of the ...

Vladimir Putin has dominated Russian politics since Boris Yeltsin relinquished the presidency in his favour in May 2000. He served two terms as president, before himself relinquishing the post to his prime minister, Dimitri Medvedev, only to return to presidential power for a third time in 2012.Putin’s rule, whether as president or prime minister, has been marked by a steady increase in domestic repression and international assertiveness. Despite this, there have been signs of libe...

'A terrific book about a terrifying subject by the best historian of Russia working today' - Michael BurleighIn Blood on the Snow, Robert Service returns to the subject that has formed the backbone of his long and distinguished career: the Russian Revolution.For Service, the great unanswered question is how to reconcile the two vital narratives that underpin the extraordinary but troubled events of 1917. One puts the blame squarely...

Russia has long played an influential part in its world of Islam, and not all the dimensions are as widely understood as they ought to be. In Russia and Its Islamic World, Robert Service examines Russia's interactions with Islam at home and around the globe and pinpoints the tsarist and Soviet legacy, current complications, and future possibilities. The author details how the Russian encounter with Islam was close and problematic long before the twenty-first century and how Russia...

A riveting account of the last eighteen months of Tsar Nicholas II's life and reign from one of our finest historians of Russia.In March 1917, Nicholas II, the last Tsar of All the Russias, abdicated and the dynasty that had ruled an empire for three hundred years was forced from power by revolution. Now, on the hundredth anniversary of that revolution, Robert Service, the eminent historian of Russia, examines Nicholas's reign in the year before his abdication and ...