All the Kremlin's Men

Inside the Court of Vladimir Putin

By: Mikhail Zygar

Narrated by: Dan Woren

Length: 16 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

An extraordinary behind-the-scenes portrait of the court of Vladimir Putin, the oligarchs that surround it, and the many moods of modern Russia that reads like a "real House of Cards"(Lev Lurie).

All the Kremlin's Men is a gripping narrative of an accidental king and a court out of control. Based on an unprecedented series of interviews with Vladimir Putin's inner circle, this book presents a radically different view of power and politics in Russia. The image of Putin as a strongman is dissolved. In its place is a weary figurehead buffeted - if not controlled - by the men who at once advise and deceive him. The regional governors and bureaucratic leaders are immovable objects, far more powerful in their fiefdoms than the president himself. So are the gatekeepers - those officials who guard the pathways to power-on whom Putin depends as much as they rely on him. The tenuous edifice is filled with all of the intrigue and plotting of a Medici court, as enemies of the state are invented and wars begun to justify personal gains, internal rivalries, or one faction's biased advantage. 

A best seller in Russia, All the Kremlin's Men is a shocking revisionist portrait of the Putin era and a dazzling reconstruction of the machinations of courtiers running riot.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2016 Mikhail Zygar (P)2017 Hachette Audio

Enough with the Russian accents!

This is such an amazing book. But the reader insisted on doing a Russian accent any time a Russian was speaking. It ended up being super distracting.

Pass the weak sauce

I expected a truthful hard-hitting expose and I got a cold hot dog with relish instead. It's hard to believe that anyone worth their weight as a journalist would write such a bland limp-wristed portrait of the world's most corrupt and criminal leader. Oh, I forgot, he still lives in Russia.

An Anna Politkovskaya he is NOT. I suggest reading something a little less whitewashy like Karen Dawisha, Masha Gessen, or Bill Browder. Anyone who reads this will know less than when they started...

Good narration, though.

Very insightful and we'll researched view of Putin

I greatly enjoyed this well researched book on how Putin's government operates and views the world. It also provides significant insight into the nature of Putin's character and how his views have evolved over time.

Clearly there is a great deal of blame to go around between the West and Russia for the breakdown in their relations and this book fairly details that.

My only complaint is the narrator's insistence on using a bad Russian accident when quoting Russians. This accient is even used for German and Arab protagonists. Would have been better to have had no accient at all.

Otherwise it is an all-round great listen and super interning and insightful.

Withheld assessment by Russian journalist; painful narration

Mikhail Zygar is a Russian journalist. His narrative in this book is informative, yet his assessments are measured, conventional, politic. There isn’t anything new. He leaves facts out or simply skims over them which have been described in other books whose authors have not been under the control of the Putin regime. Zygar is courageous in writing this book that is based on his interviews with officials and witnesses, and tv interviews, newspapers, popular magazines, and trade journals. As such, Zygar’s credibility has to be taken into account. After reading other books on the subject before reading this book, I would not recommend this book as one’s sole source for gathering research or knowledge about Putin or his regime. Now, as to the narration. It drove me to distraction due to Dan Woren’s insistence on trying to take on a Russian accent. It was a dismal failure. Otherwise his reading was average.

No need for the fake accent

Interesting book, but the fake Russian accent was absolutely unnecessary, especially considering that the narrator mispronounced almost every non-English name and sometimes he even invented different ways to say the same name.

Horrible narration

The narrator uses a fake, stereotyped Russian accent, including when he reads quotes from Russians who speak fluent and unaccented English, and he mispronounces almost every name he comes across. It would be comically bad if it didn’t make it so painful to listen.
Read the book.

Terrible narration

I was looking forward to ‘re-read’ of this amazing book that reads like a thriller but has to return it because of the awful narration. Narrator uses this god awful, cringe worthy Russian accent when reading quotes of Russians which made it very hard for me to listen and I had to give up after hour or so of listening.

Get the printed book

Bad narration killed this for me. Couldn't ge to the end. Most of the time narration is fine, but whenever the narrator would quote something said by Russians, he would insist on doing this cringy B-movie Russian accent, which will distract you from whatever the character is saying.
Curiously, the narrator doesn't do, say, British or American accents when he's quoting people from these places - which would at least make some sense, since these lines were originally spoken in English.

good book

Interesting book. Great narration but I really wish the narrator did not use the fake Russian accent.

Exceptional

This is one of those books that one just has to read/listen. I would have to say it’s terrifying, stunning, more like a thriller really. It really changes perspective. Narrative is clear and pleasant

Brilliant analysis, awful narration

I listened to this having watched a lecture by a US intelligence expert on Russia, who described Zygar as the foremost analyst of Putin's Russia. Having spent time in Russia many years ago and following its politics ever since, I sense his assessment is correct. This narrative rings true, with numerous interviews with some of the peripheral players in this Byzantine story. This book carries important insights as we see a new Cold War no longer predicted, but seemingly now accepted as fact.

I have to agree, though, with another reviewer; the narrator is awful. Admittedly he has a challenge as the book is peppered with verbatim quotes from the various interviewees, and it is important to distinguish between these and the author's own "voice". So a bad "James Bond baddie" accent ("Ah Mister Bond, what an unexpected pleasure") might be excusable. But what really mars the book is his pronunciation of surnames. They are not just odd, they are flat wrong. I sometimes struggled to understand who he was talking about until I cottoned on and thought: "Oh, he means HIM!". In this vein, Prime Minister and ex-President Medvedev is given a degree of anonymity that the FSB could not achieve. In Russian, many surnames change when referring to a female, with an "a" added at the end. In the mouth of this narrator, Shevardnadze and Lyushenko are amongst many senior political figures who undergo a sex change.

All of this is not enough to ruin a powerful piece of investigative journalism, but it does make it a good deal harder to follow a complex web of intrigue. Beyond that, it just grates like hell.

An excellent analysis

This is a really good retelling of Putin’s rise to power and of the “collective Putin” that has run Russia through the first two decades of the 21st century. It provides a great deal of insight into intrigues and fills in important details missing from many Western analyses.

The only criticism I have is of the narrator. Between his inability to pronounce key names (e.g. he keeps saying “Volushin” in lieu of “Voloshin”) and his unfortunate decision to voice quotations from Russians with an “Ensign Chekhov” accent, he has detracted from an otherwise riveting book.

An amazing look at the rise of Putin

A fantastic book, a well researched look into the rise of Putin. I encourage everyone, not just Russophiles to take a read. It would do the world a lot of good to understand the political situation in which the world currently stands.

Excellent summary of the modern Russian scene

Eye opening accounts of the Russia from the 1990s till 2016. It is rare to find independent journalistic reports of Russia and this book is one of them. A must read it you're interested in world politics with Russia in mind.

Insightful and fascinating

Listening to this in April 2022 two months after Russia invaded Ukraine - again. But this time in much great scale having ability to learn historical events leading up to present time put perspective why Russia behaves like it behaves and most importantly why West view of Russia was to put it mildly naive.

Superb.

Very thorough and expansive look at one of the most polarizing figures of our time.

informative

insightful as well as being disturbing. A few minds can destroy many lives. we really need to evolve past national ego.

Narration

Narration was rubbish, but a very insightful story of Putin and his Siloviki. I wish there was another version, without the narrator trying to do a russian accent.

A good look at 90s Russian politics, but bad Russian accent

A really interesting listen with a great amount of information, but the sheer amount of grammatical errors and terrible put on Russian accents that border on the obscene and parody are a put off.

Putin Explained ....

The book helps to explain our world today i.e.2022 and Putin's paranoia with Ukraine and the surrounding former Soviet states. A very engrossing read though sometimes repetitive.