Books - Nonfiction

How Russia Got That Way

Sat, 20 Sep 2025 05:00:00 GMT

A fast-paced crash course in Russian history, from Norsemen to Navalny, that explores the ways the Kremlin uses history to achieve its ends.

Resilience ~ The Russian Version (Переживем)

Fri, 17 Aug 2018 05:00:00 GMT

Call it resilience, grit, or just perseverance – it takes a special sort of person to have survived the last 100 years of Russian and Soviet history.

Resilience: Life Stories of Centenarians Born in the Year of Revolution

Mon, 05 Mar 2018 06:00:00 GMT

Call it resilience, grit, or just perseverance – it takes a special sort of person to have survived the last 100 years of Russian and Soviet history.

Maria's War: A Soldier's Autobiography

Mon, 09 Jan 2017 06:00:00 GMT

This astonishingly gripping autobiography by the founder of the Russian Women’s Death Battallion in World War I is an eye-opening documentary of life before, during and after the Bolshevik Revolution.

Driving Down Russia's Spine

Wed, 01 Jun 2016 05:00:00 GMT

The story of the epic Spine of Russia trip, intertwining fascinating subject profiles with digressions into historical and cultural themes relevant to understanding modern Russia.

Bears in the Caviar

Fri, 01 May 2015 05:00:00 GMT

Bears in the Caviar is a hilarious and insightful memoir by a diplomat who was “present at the creation” of US-Soviet relations. Charles Thayer headed off to Russia in 1933, calculating that if he could just learn Russian and be on the spot when the US and USSR established relations, he could make himself indispensable and start a career in the foreign service. Remarkably, he pulled it of.

East of the Sun: The Epic Conquest and Tragic History of Siberia

Mon, 01 Dec 2014 06:00:00 GMT

The very word Siberia evokes a history and reputation as awesome as it is enthralling. In this acclaimed book on Russia’s conquest of its eastern realms, Benson Bobrick offers a story that is both rich and subtle, broad and deep.

Fearful Majesty

Tue, 01 Jul 2014 05:00:00 GMT

This acclaimed biography of one of Russia’s most important and tyrannical rulers is not only a rich, readable biography, it is also surprisingly timely, revealing how many of the issues Russia faces today have their roots in Ivan’s reign.

Moscow and Muscovites

Tue, 26 Nov 2013 06:00:00 GMT

Vladimir Gilyarovsky's classic portrait of the Russian capital is one of Russians’ most beloved books. Yet it has never before been translated into English. Until now! It is a spectactular verbal pastiche: conversation, from gutter gibberish to the drawing room; oratory, from illiterates to aristocrats; prose, from boilerplate to Tolstoy; poetry, from earthy humor to Pushkin.

A Taste of Russia

Thu, 01 Nov 2012 06:00:00 GMT

The definitive modern cookbook on Russian cuisine has been totally updated and redesigned in a 30th Anniversary Edition. Layering superbly researched recipes with informative essays on the dishes' rich historical and cultural context, A Taste of Russia includes over 200 recipes on everything from borshch to blini, from Salmon Coulibiac to Beef Stew with Rum, from Marinated Mushrooms to Walnut-honey Filled Pies. A Taste of Russia shows off the best that Russian cooking has to offer. Full of great quotes from Russian literature about Russian food and designed in a convenient wide format that stays open during use.

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

Thu, 01 Nov 2012 06:00:00 GMT

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.

Jews in Service to the Tsar

Sun, 09 Oct 2011 05:00:00 GMT

Benjamin Disraeli advised, “Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.” With Jews in Service to the Tsar, Lev Berdnikov offers us 28 biographies spanning five centuries of Russian Jewish history, and each portrait opens a new window onto the history of Eastern Europe’s Jews, illuminating dark corners and challenging widely-held conceptions about the role of Jews in Russian history.

Marooned in Moscow

Sun, 01 May 2011 05:00:00 GMT

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.

301 Things Everyone Should Know About Russia

Wed, 01 Sep 2010 05:00:00 GMT

How do you begin to get a handle on the world's largest country? This colorful, illustrated guide will get you started...

Survival Russian

Sun, 01 Feb 2009 06:00:00 GMT

Survival Russian is an intensely practical guide to conversational, colloquial and culture-rich Russian. It uses humor, current events and thematically-driven essays to deepen readers’ understanding of Russian language and culture. This enlarged Second Edition of Survival Russian includes over 90 essays and illuminates over 2000 invaluable Russian phrases and words.

93 Untranslatable Russian Words

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 06:00:00 GMT

Every language has concepts, ideas, words and idioms that are nearly impossible to translate into another language. This book looks at nearly 100 such Russian words and offers paths to their understanding and translation by way of examples from literature and everyday life. Difficult to translate words and concepts are introduced with dictionary definitions, then elucidated with citations from literature, speech and prose, helping the student of Russian comprehend the word/concept in context.