Shadow State

Murder, Mayhem, and Russia's Remaking of the West

By: Luke Harding

Narrated by: Nicholas Guy Smith

Length: 12 hrs and 47 mins

Publisher's summary

A thrilling account of how Russia is waging a hidden war against America and the West, using espionage, corruption, fake news, and KGB-style murder

March 2018. Two Russian assassins arrive in a provincial English city to kill a former officer from Russia’s GRU intelligence agency. His crime? Passing secrets to British spies. The poison? A lethal nerve agent, novichok. The attempted execution was a reminder - as if one were needed - of Russia’s contempt for international norms. The Soviet Union and its doctrine are long gone, but the playbook used by the Kremlin’s spies during that long confrontation with the West is back. And the underlying goal remains the same: to undermine democracy and exploit divisions within American and European society and politics.

Moscow’s support for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election has grown into the biggest political scandal of modern times. Its American players are well-known. In Shadow State, award-winning journalist and best-selling author Luke Harding reveals the Russians behind the story: the spies, hackers, and internet trolls. Harding charts how the Kremlin has updated Communist-era methods of influence and propaganda for the age of Facebook and Twitter, and considers the compelling question of our age: what exactly does Vladimir Putin have on President Trump?

Similar to those of the Cold War, Putin’s ambitions are truly global. His emissaries include oligarchs, bankers, lawyers, mercenaries, and agents of influence. They roam from Salisbury to Helsinki, Ukraine to Central Africa, London to Washington, DC. Shadow State is the singular account of how the Kremlin seeks to reshape the world, to divide the US from its European friends, and to remake America in its own dark and kleptocratic image. This is an essential read for anyone who wants to understand how our politics came to be so chaotic and divided. Nothing less than the future of Western democracy is at stake.

©2020 Luke Harding (P)2020 HarperCollins Publishers

Excellent book, not a good reader performance

Luke Harding's research is always solid and I love how he writes. However, the reader of this important book couldn't bother to learn how to pronounce Russian names or Robert Mueller's last name. It is jarring to hear such bad pronunciations and very distracting.

Great to hear Steele's response to the last few years and as we know now Trump was OK with US soldiers being killed by the Taliban for Russian bounties all of this book makes sense.

Well worth the wait.

The reader is mispronouncing words!

I have never heard the GRU, Russian military intelligence pronounced as "grew" before. It's always spelt out as G-R-U like KGB. The producer should have picked this up. Just as annoying is the pronunciation of Robert Mueller's surname. It may look like "Mewler" but Robert Mueller says is "Mull-er" so this fanciful pronunciation is incredibly irritating - it's not like we haven't all heard it said correctly thousands of times for three years. Also many of the Russian names are incorrect and told in a slapdash way. That this could happen with an important book by a major author is truly head-scratching. Very unprofessional, this book should be rerecorded properly. These details are incredibly important to get right, it's really setting my teeth on edge and I've only just started.....
Halfway through and the "Grew" for GRU is just as irritatiing. Does Nicholas Guy Smith the reader just make up whimsical pronunciations for fun? He actually refers to FIFA as "fyffer". He's English, he knows this is not how you prounce FIFA, he's a quite experienced reader as well so he has no excuse PLUS the producer should have said something, it's real amateur hour. Perhaps he is being held hostage and is trying to tell us something with his bizarre proununciations.

Engaging history of Russian subversion

Excellent and engaging history of Russian subversive activities in the west. Lots of detail with interesting information for everybody who has an interest in that area. Of course it is better to know all these things, but hard to remember

Luke Harding is a great journalist

This is the 2nd book of Harding's I've read, he's a brave and brilliant journalist. He can make complex information easy and fascinating to take in. Important for anyone anywhere who wants to understand Putin's kleptocratic regime and global malfeasance.

Thorough

As always, Luke Harding brings it.
Thorough review with historical context of how Russia has destabilized western governments using his KGB training and it is a continuing national security issue around the world.
I don’t agree with other reviews about the performance though. I thought the narrator performed brilliantly. His voice was pleasant and understandable with good pacing. Many people are unaware of the many differences between the Queen’s English and American English pronunciations. Plus the number of Russian names in this book must be close to a hundred and I am not sure I could have done better without taking a Russian language course.
I have heard Robert Mueller’s name pronounced differently in the US so that didn’t bother me in the least.

The Most Dangerous Threat to Western Democracy

Every voting citizen of the United States and Great Britian should read this book. Luke Harding shows us in irrebuttable detail how Russia's Putin orchestrated the rise to power of Donald Trump and Boris Johnson, and the Brexit vote's success. Putin's goal is no less than the destruction of western democracy. Putin, whose agents committed murder on British sovereign soil, will not rest until America and the UK are too weak to resist. Then Russia will move to retake those EU countries not already lost to xenophobic, populist strongmen.

Good

Solid work and appreciate the perspective from all fronts. The connection between actors is incredible and interesting.