Stalin: New Biography of a Dictator - Oleg Khelvniuk

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⭐ 5.5/10

(Originally written by Joseph)

A biography of Stalin that is altogether just too political and technical for my taste. It was written by a Russian historian and then translated, so the audience was probably someone who has at least a tiny bit of background in Russian politics or at least someone who can differentiate one Russian name from another. The book offered some interesting insight, but it didn't focus on the person as much as his policies which I'm not crazy about. Lastly, although obviously he was not a good person, I still found the author too biased in that he outlined all the horrendous things he did in detail, and summed up any good as political posturing, which could very well have been the case, but either way I just didn't enjoy listening to an 18 hour audiobook about someone with zero redeeming qualities.

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