The untold history of Moscow's Metropol hotel—a fervent spot of intrigue, secrets, and the center of Stalin's nefarious propaganda during WWII.*A Washington Post Best Book of the Year*In 1941, when German armies were marching towards Moscow, Lenin’s body was moved from his tomb on Red Square and taken to Siberia. By1945, a victorious Stalin had turned a poor country into a victorious superpower. Over the course of those four years,...

'A riveting trip down the corridors of Soviet deception' Sunday Telegraph (Five-Star Review)'Philps' book vindicates the value of truth' Washington Post'Philps has an eye for detail and a heart for those left behind' The Times'A tale of intrigue and suppression' New York Times*'*A compelling and often horrifying tale of moral degradation and occasional her...

In 1990, a young boy afflicted with cerebral palsy was born, prematurely, in Russia. His name was Vanya. His mother abandoned him to the state childcare system and he was sent to a bleak orphanage called Baby House 10. Once there, he entered a nightmare world he was not to leave for more than eight years. Housed in a ward with a group of other children, he was clothed in rags, ignored by most of the staff and given little, if any, medical treatment. He was finally, and cruelly, confined fo...

Gripping expose revealing one of the last secrets of the Soviet empire: its abuse of children in state institutions.'Deeply moving, frequently enraging and ultimately uplifting' DAILY MAIL'A miracle story' IRISH TIMESThis is the affecting true story of a remarkable young boy named John Lahutsky. John, born in Russia in 1990, was afflicted with cerebral palsy, abandoned by his birth mother and consigned to certain death in the deplor...

In THE RED HOTEL: THE UNTOLD STORY OF STALIN'S DISINFORMATION WAR, former Daily Telegraph Foreign Editor and Russian expert Alan Philps sets out the way Stalin created his own reality by constraining and muzzling the British and American reporters covering the Eastern front during the war and forcing them to reproduce Kremlin propaganda. War correspondents were both bullied and pampered in a gilded cage of the

Drawing on remarkable and never-before-seen material, the extraordinary story of one of the most horrific and devastating encounters of the Second World War.'This is a truly astounding book, packed with searing hitherto-unpublished testimony about what it was like to endure, and ultimately defeat, the most formidable invasion in the history of Mankind. The sheer endurance of the Russian people between 1941 and 1945 will leave readers utterly staggered. It is a debt...

The astonishing year when German democracy faced crisis and near destruction.1923 was one of the most remarkable years of modern European history. In January, France and Belgium militarily occupied Germany's economic heartland, the Ruhr; triggering a series of crises that almost spiralled out of control. Hyperinflation plunged millions into poverty. The search for scapegoats empowered political extremes. Hitler's populism ascended to national prominence. Communists...

The story of how the British shaped sport, and sport shaped the British.Sport is an enduring element of British life and culture. Few other strands of Britain's history touch on so many significant aspects of past and present: national identity, class, gender, the relationship between country and town, the rise of commerce, the evolution of ethical debate. And that's apart from the on-field action - the triumphs and heartbreaks that have become part of the national...

From the internationally acclaimed author of Hitler's Private Library, a dramatic recounting of the six critical months before Adolf Hitler assumed power, when the Nazi leader teetered between triumph and ruin.In the summer of 1932, the Weimar Republic was on the verge of collapse. One in three Germans was unemployed. Violence was rampant. Hitler's National Socialists surged at the polls. Paul von Hindenburg, an aging war hero and avowed monarchist, was a ...

Oxford thought it was at war. And then it was.After the horrors of the First World War, Oxford looked like an Arcadia - a dream world - from which pain could be shut out. Soldiers arrived with pictures of the university fully formed in their heads, and women finally won the right to earn degrees. Freedom meant reading beneath the spires and punting down the river with champagne picnics. But all was not quite as it seemed.The women of Oxford still faced a battle to emerge f...

'Murder in the Gulag is brilliant journalistic writing: punchy, eloquent, page-turning and factual. It's a powerful reminder of what an extraordinary man Navalny was' - Roland Oliphant, TelegraphThe gripping sequel to the bestselling Killer in the Kremlin, revised and updated for paperback publication.2:19pm, Moscow time, 16 February 2024. The Federal Penitentiary Service of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District a...

A RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK'Wild Swans for Ukraine ... rich and magnificent' Bookseller**'A paean to hope and home. I loved it and it will haunt me'HELEN MACDONALD'Marvellously vivid and often heartbreaking... I read it in a single enthralled sitting'MIRANDA SEYMOUR'An instant classic: an essential book in these darkening times'SOPHY ROBERTS...