About the Author

Simon Sebag Montefiore is the internationally bestselling author of prize-winning books that have been published in forty-eight languages. CATHERINE THE GREAT & POTEMKIN was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize; STALIN: THE COURT OF THE RED TSAR won History Book of the Year Prize at the British Book Awards; YOUNG STALIN won the Costa Biography Award, the LA Times Book Prize for Biography, the Kreisky Prize and the Grand Prix de la Biographie Politique; JERUSALEM: THE BIOGRAPHY won the JBC Book of the Year Prize and the Wenjin Book Prize in China; THE ROMANOVS: 1613-1918 won the Lupicaia del Terriccio Book Prize. He is the author of the Moscow Trilogy of novels: SASHENKA, RED SKY AT NOON and ONE NIGHT IN WINTER, which won the Political Fiction Book of the Year Award. He is also the author of WRITTEN IN HISTORY: LETTERS THAT CHANGED THE WORLD and VOICES OF HISTORY: SPEECHES THAT CHANGED THE WORLD.

Reviews

One of the two outstanding books of the year ... the most civilised and elegant chronicle of brutality and ruthlessness I have ever read, its prose cool and clear but never indifferent - Daily TelegraphHorrific, revelatory and sobering ... triumph of research and should be required reading in Russia. Book of the Year - ObserverThis grim masterpiece, shot through with lashes of black humour ... The personal details are riveting - Mail on SundayFascinating ... [Montefiore] concentrates, as any good historian should, on pushing forward the boundaries of our knowledge of the subject ... [He] provides rich detail of daily life and family relationships in a world of human values turned inside out ... scrupulously fair in the way he describes Stalin's qualities - including his ability to charm, his uncanny grasp of geopolitical issues, his brilliant handling of foreign statesmen and his genuine passion for literature - Sunday Times