Russia: Part Two: The Rise and Fall of the Soviets

There is an astonishing lack of proportion and emphasis. The communist regime killed millions of peasants. The prison system established by the communists was a source of slave labor as well as a means of suppressing dissent. The Russians dealt with minorities in a particularly bloody and brutal manner. While each of these topics is covered, it is hasty. Instead, Martin Sixsmith spends an inordinate amount of time on covering the day-to-day minutia of the USSR's downfall and his coverage of it for the BBC.

I have read his Putin's Oil which is a superior work.

This is a rebroadcast of BBC's "Russia: The Wild East, Part 2" presented in 25 episodes. Although Sixsmith is the primary narrator, there are interviews, clips from news accounts, tape recorded speeches of historical figures, quotes from poems, choirs singing in the background, etc. In many respects the historical characters speak for themselves.

There is far too much turf to cover for this to be made into a movie.

Martin Sixsmith is a BBC journalist who served in the USSR, Poland, and Washington. He was Tony Blair's Director of Communications and has written both fiction and non-fiction books. I would recommend this audiobook for someone who wants a general overview of the events of the past century. However, it does not come close to describing the full magnitude of atrocities perpetrated by the Soviet regime.

I liked this audiobook very much specially because of the "practical" approach the author gives to the Russian History. He and his personal experience as a journalist in Russia during the late 20th century make it specially interesting.

I've listened to other audiobooks on Russian History, including Stalin's biography and I couldn't keep focused as on this one.

I really enjoyed this audiobook and so far, three weeks after buying it, I've heard it more than twice

I would. It has some parts of Soviet history I didn't know about until now.

I can't think of anything to compare it to.

He didn't perform them, but his interviews are impressive.

Wintnes to History.

Dynamic survey of Soviet history from the revolution up through Putin

Story-teller really knew his stuff -- knew the people, the places,a nd the context of the things he describes

Growing up during the cold war, there were many things we didn't know at the time, that have only been revealed with the release of Soviet archives. Similarly, there were a lot things that happened in the post-Gorbachev era that I remember when the happened, but didn't have a great understanding of what they meant. This book rectified all that.

Yes I would. This part was very interesting, I learned a great deal.

Narrator, he was great. Lived through this and he was very engaing.

no

no, I knew what was comming. I lived through this.

It made me want to visit Saint Petersburg more than ever.

This is a very well produced audio program that draws you in and makes it very easy to lose track of time.