Book cover of Resistance: The Underground War Against Hitler, 1939-1945 by Halik Kochanski
Eastern Europe

Resistance: The Underground War Against Hitler, 1939-1945

In every country that fell to the Third Reich during the Second World War, from France in the west to parts of the Soviet Union in the east, a resistance movement against Nazi domination emerged. And every country that endured occupation created its own fiercely nationalist account of the role of homegrown resistance in its eventual liberation. Halik Kochanski’s panoramic, prodigiously researched work is a monumental achievement: the first book to strip these disparate national histories of myth and nostalgia and to integrate them into a definitive chronicle of the underground war against the Nazis. […Learn More]

Book cover of In the Midst of Civilized Europe: The Pogroms of 1918–1921 and the Onset of the Holocaust by Jeffrey Veidlinger
Eastern Europe

In the Midst of Civilized Europe: The Pogroms of 1918–1921 and the Onset of the Holocaust

Between 1918 and 1921, over a hundred thousand Jews were murdered in Ukraine by peasants, townsmen, and soldiers who blamed the Jews for the turmoil of the Russian Revolution. In hundreds of separate incidents, ordinary people robbed their Jewish neighbors with impunity, burned down their houses, ripped apart their Torah scrolls, sexually assaulted them, and killed them. Largely forgotten today, these pogroms—ethnic riots—dominated headlines and international affairs in their time. Aid workers warned that six million Jews were in danger of complete extermination. Twenty years later, these dire predictions would come true. […Learn More]

Book cover of The Lighthouse of Stalingrad: The Hidden Truth at the Heart of the Greatest Battle of World War II by Iain MacGregor
Eastern Europe

The Lighthouse of Stalingrad: The Hidden Truth at the Heart of the Greatest Battle of World War II 

To the Soviet Union, the sacrifices that enabled the country to defeat Nazi Germany in World War II were sacrosanct. The foundation of the Soviets’ hard-won victory was laid during the battle for the city of Stalingrad, resting on the banks of the Volga River. To Russians, it is a pivotal landmark of their nation’s losses, with more than two million civilians and combatants either killed, wounded, or captured during the bitter fighting from September 1942 to February 1943. Both sides endured terrible conditions in brutal, relentless house-to-house fighting. […Learn More]

Book cover of Russia: Revolution and Civil War, 1917-1921 by Antony Beevor
Eastern Europe

Russia: Revolution and Civil War, 1917-1921

An epic new account of the conflict that reshaped Eastern Europe and set the stage for the rest of the twentieth century.

Between 1917 and 1921 a devastating struggle took place in Russia following the collapse of the Tsarist empire. The doomed White alliance of moderate socialists and reactionary monarchists stood little chance against Trotsky’s Red Army and the single-minded Communist dictatorship under Lenin. […Learn More]

Book cover of The Escape Artist: The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World by Jonathan Freedland
Biography & Autobiography

The Escape Artist: The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World

Award-winning journalist and bestselling novelist Jonathan Freedland tells the incredible story of Rudolf Vrba—the first Jew to break out of Auschwitz, a man determined to warn the world and pass on a truth too few were willing to hear—elevating him to his rightful place in the annals of World War II alongside Anne Frank, Primo Levi, and Oskar Schindler and casting a new light on the Holocaust and its aftermath. […Learn More]

Book cover of Crimea: A History by Neil Kent
Eastern Europe

Crimea: A History

In 2014 Crimea shapes the headlines much as it did some 160 years ago, when the Crimean War pitted Britain, France and Turkey against Russia. Yet few books have been published on the history of the peninsula. For many readers, Crimea seems as remote today as it was when colonized by the ancient Greeks. […Learn More]

Book cover of Jozef Pilsudski: Founding Father of Modern Poland by Joshua Zimmerman
Biography & Autobiography

Jozef Pilsudski: Founding Father of Modern Poland

The story of the enigmatic Jozef Pilsudski, the founding father of modern Poland: a brilliant military leader and high-minded statesman who betrayed his own democratic vision by seizing power in a military coup.

In the story of modern Poland, no one stands taller than Jozef Pilsudski. From the age of sixteen he devoted his life to reestablishing the Polish state that had ceased to exist in 1795. […Learn More]

Book cover of Collapse: The Fall of the Soviet Union by V. M. Zubok
Biography & History

Collapse: The Fall of the Soviet Union 

A major study of the collapse of the Soviet Union—showing how Gorbachev’s misguided reforms led to its demise

In 1945 the Soviet Union controlled half of Europe and was a founding member of the United Nations. By 1991, it had an army four-million strong, five-thousand nuclear-tipped missiles, and was the second biggest producer of oil in the world. […Learn More]