In a snow-covered village in Chechnya, eight-year-old Havaa watches as her father is abducted by Russian soldiers. Their neighbor Akhmed takes Havaa to the bombed-out hospital of Sonja Rabina. Sonja has no desire to take on more responsibility and risk -- there's someone of her own whose return she doesn't want to jeopardize. But over the course of five extraordinary days, Sonja's world will shift on its axis.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra, and The Romanovs returns with another masterpiece of narrative biography, the extraordinary story of an obscure young German princess who traveled to Russia at fourteen and rose to become one of the most remarkable, powerful, and captivating women in history. Born into a minor noble family, Catherine transformed herself into Empress of Russia by sheer determination. Possessing...

Hailed for her "fearless indictment of the most powerful man in Russia" (The Wall Street Journal), award-winning journalist Masha Gessen is unparalleled in her understanding of the events and forces that have wracked her native country in recent times. In The Future Is History, she follows the lives of four people born at what promised to be the dawn of democracy. Each of them came of age with unprecedented expectations, some as the children and grandchildren...

Big Oil and Gas versus democracy -- winner take all. In 2010, the words "earthquake swarm" entered the lexicon in Oklahoma. That same year, a trove of Michael Jackson memorabilia -- including his iconic crystal-encrusted white glove -- was sold at auction for over $1 million to a guy who was, officially, just the lowly forestry minister of the tiny nation of Equatorial Guinea. And in 2014, Ukrainian revolutionaries raided the palace of their ousted...

Notes from the Underground is a novella by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Notes is considered by many to be the first existentialist novel. It presents itself as an excerpt from the rambling memoirs of a bitter, isolated, unnamed narrator (generally referred to by critics as the Underground Man) who is a retired civil servant living in St. Petersburg. The first part of the story is told in monologue form, or the underground man's diary, and attacks emerging...

"After a harrowing escape from Russian agents on his last mission, Charles Jenkins thinks he's finally done with the spy game. But then the final two of the seven sisters - American assets who have been deep undercover in Russia for decades - cut off all communication with their handlers. Are they in hiding after detecting surveillance? Or have they turned and become double agents? It's Jenkins's duty to find out, but he's been added to a Russian...

In 1917 Nicholas II, Tsar of Russia, was executed by revolutionaries. Now, in response to the collapse of the country's economy, the people have voted to instate a new Tsar, one who will be chosen from the descendents of Nicholas II. But a powerful group of Western businessmen want to make sure he is a candidate they can control, and hire African-American lawyer Miles Lord, with his knowledge of Russian language and history, to check the background...

When Russian President Valeri Volodin's ambitions are foiled in Dagestan, he faces a difficult choice. The oligarchs who support him expect a constant flow of graft, but with energy prices cratering, the Russian economy sputters to a virtual halt. A floating natural gas facility in Lithuania is blown up. A Venezuelan prosecutor is assassinated. A devastating attack on a Russian troop train kills dozens. Only one man recognizes an ominous pattern in...

The story begins when Myshkin arrives on Russian soil after a stay in a Swiss sanatorium. Scorned by St. Petersburg society as an idiot for his generosity and innocence, the prince finds himself at the center of a struggle between a rich, kept woman and a beautiful, virtuous girl, who both hope to win his affection. Unfortunately, Myshkin's very goodness seems to bring disaster to everyone he meets. The shocking denouement tragically reveals how,...

"Wrapping up his latest assignment for the Magellan Billet, Luke Daniels receives a surprise visit from the head of a former-CIA operation named Sommerhaus -- a failed attempt to assemble an espionage network within the Ukraine on the eve of the Russian invasion. Sommerhaus ranks high on Luke's list of painful regrets for it was during this mission that his friend, CIA case officer John Vince, was captured by Russian operatives and supposedly executed....