A Book Map on contemporary Russia

A book nut that I am, studying well researched books on times of not so distant past captivated me. Especially one concerned of a major piece of land, that got locked by resentment and got poisoned by insidious ideology and how that corrupted the internet or financial air paths, clogged and dismantled checks of reason and instruments of civil institutional opposition.

A list is in no way a complete and exhausting, only providing a personal perspective and choice of books — not covering those about distant times that are covered by Figes about Russian history in general or Sebarg Montefiore about Romanovs or Kotkin monumental 2 volumes that are published about Stalin.

I’ve tried to connect them alongside:

• The memoirs of diplomats, including one by Strobe Talbott — the book that I hunted for when it was first published in 2002.
• The contemporaneous history by respected journalists or humanities authors
• Ideology studies — that saw quite early dark overtones that international politics chose to ignore
• The money trail and how vehemently any insinuations about corruption were silenced.

Several additions in RU language, should one be willing to find translations or look for oneself:

• A perfect analogy about times past of Nikolas I (1825–1855) and the police state that rolled back the liberal thoughts and hopes of some;
• A biography of Boris Nemtsov, and through it — a history of contemporary Russia;
• A near biography of a “king-maker” during the reign of President Boris Yeltsin — Valentin Yumashev.