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The Good Russian

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What to expect

"An important and necessary book... a work of honesty and humanity," Mishal Husain

"This is a unique and necessary book. The Good Russian takes us inside wartime Russia, to a city that Jana Bakunina knows intimately. She brings us face to face with ordinary Russians, and also tells her own compelling personal story. Best of all, she writes very well." Simon Kuper, FT journalist and author of the bestselling Chums


"A fine and brave book." Luke Harding, author of Invasion: Russia's Bloody War and Ukraine's Fight for Survival

When Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the writer Jana Bakunina, who has lived in the UK for 20 years, felt furious, ashamed, but most of all helpless. A year later she travelled to her home city of Yekaterinburg to see how ordinary Russians viewed the conflict - and whether the soul of her nation had truly been crushed.

Jana finds a booming city seemingly untouched by war. Reconnecting with old friends, she discovers people either happy to go along with a regime that has brought them stability, or else staying out of politics. Most painful of all, her once liberal father has channelled his personal disappointments into becoming a firm fan of Putin.

In the grand humane tradition of Russian dissident writers, Jana Bakunina grapples with a universal problem: what happens when a country you love becomes infected by nationalism? What hope is there when voices of conscience are silenced by dictatorship? And can Russians in exile still imagine a liberated future?

Critics Review

An important and necessary book... a work of honesty and humanity
Mishal Husain
This is a unique and necessary book. The Good Russian takes us inside wartime Russia, to a city that Jana Bakunina knows intimately. She brings us face to face with ordinary Russians, and also tells her own compelling personal story. Best of all, she writes very well
Simon Kuper, FT journalist and author of the bestselling Chums
In exile, Bakunina will be free to speak and write what she likes. It is a long and honourable Russian tradition
Financial Times
A fine and brave book
Luke Harding, author of Invasion: Russia's Bloody War and Ukraine's Fight for Survival
An important and necessary book, taking us inside the complexities of the Russian psyche at a tumultuous time. The writer is uniquely placed to be our translator and interlocutor, as she grapples with her own torment, and the result is a work of honesty and humanity
Mishal Husain
The Good Russian offers an unflinchingly honest look at the choices facing Russians today amid autocracy and war. In crisp and compelling prose, Jana Bakunina explores what Putin has done not only to her country, but also her family, taking the reader on an illuminating journey to Yekaterinburg, the city of her childhood. Perceptive, humane, and insightful
Howard Amos, author of Russia Starts Here
Unique and fascinating close-up insights into Russian thinking... The Good Russian looks to the future with a mix of foreboding and hope
Steve Crawshaw, author of Prosecuting the Powerful: War Crimes and the Battle for Justice
From the start, I have hungered to understand what ordinary Russians think of their 'special military operation.' Jana Bakunina has written a cogent, conversational, and compelling book that feeds that appetite
Lionel Shriver
A powerful and deeply personal exploration of what it means to be Russian today, from a writer seeking to understand her own country after its slide into authoritarianism and a devastating war. Engagingly written and thought provoking, this book takes the reader beyond Moscow and the well known names to probe how Russians of all kinds think in the author's own hometown, a city to which she can no longer return
Sarah Rainsford, author of Goodbye to Russia
Author Jana Bakunina
Narrator Jana Bakunina
Duration 7 hours and 9 minutes
Release Date
ISBN 9781405566407
Format Audiobook
Publisher Little, Brown Book Group
Genre Memoirs
Availability AU, GB, IE

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