Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945

"Catherine Merridale has picked the locks that kept this history hidden. . . . Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the history of the time.” ―The Economist“[A] breathtaking, sweeping, yet well-balanced and finely tuned study.” ―The Times Literary Supplement (London)“With extraordinary patience and a wonderful ear for nuance . . . [Merridale] produces what may be the best historical portrait of life in the Red Army yet published.” ―The New York Review of Books“Combines, quite effectively, painstaking historical reconstruction and sympathetic projection.” ―The New York Times“[A] profoundly empathic work of history.” ―Newsday“An impressive work of history, managing to give a sense of the amazing hardships of the frontoviki's experience.” ―The New York Sun“Succeeds admirably in fashioning a compelling portrait, helped immensely by her talent as a writer.” ―Foreign Affairs“[Merridale] does a marvelous job. Ivan's War is full of the type of information that will make you find someone to tell.” ―Richmond Times Dispatch“This book is the raw and bleeding version . . . a tightly edited, well-paced and very readable account.” ―The Seattle Times""Unprecedented in its approach, Catherine Merridale's research into the lives of Red Army soldiers combined with her perception makes this a most fascinating and important work.” ―Antony Beevor, author of Stalingrad“Catherine Merridale has done something very unusual. The Soviet war effort has been described many times but her new book tells the searing story from the bottom up. Her account of the sufferings of the Red Army soldiers and their families is unlikely to be bettered.” ―Robert Service, author of Stalin: A Biography“Merridale's new book is excellent. This unique, strikingly original account of the Red Army in World War II is a first-rate social history as well as an important military study, and a stellar example of the combination of oral history with standard archival research. It makes the soldiers of the Red Army come alive.” ―Stanley Payne, Hilldale-Jaume Vicens Vives Professor of History, University of Wisconsin-Madison“Ivan's War is a marvelous book. All of Catherine Merridale's virtues are on display: remarkable research (based in this case on literally hundreds of interviews with survivors and witnesses); a clear, unpretentious style that belies the complexity of her material; comfortable historical command of a dauntingly large theme; and a rare compassion and empathy for her subjects. Ivan's War confirms what anyone who read Night of Stone already knew: that Catherine Merridale is a superb historian, among the very best of her generation.” ―Tony Judt, author of Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945“This is an inventively researched and evocatively written study of the Soviet soldier on the blood-ridden Eastern Front. Using freshly available archival materials, as well as sparkling interviews with a vanishing generation of veterans, Merridale has provided an empathetic and realistic portrait of the men and women who, more than any other combat soldiers, brought down the Third Reich.” ―Norman M. Naimark , author of The Russians in Germany and Fires of Hatred Catherine Merridale is the author of the critically acclaimed Ivan’s War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945 , and Night of Stone: Death and Memory in Russia . A professor of contemporary history at Queen Mary University of London, she has also written for The Guardian , the Literary Review , and the London Review of Books , and contributes regularly to broadcasts on BBC radio. She lives in Oxfordshire, England. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Ivan's War Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939--1945 By Catherine Merridale Picador USA Copyright © 2007 Catherine MerridaleAll right reserved. ISBN: 9780312426521 It was Kamenshchikov’s wife who woke him. xa0xa0xa0xa0 Perhaps it was her inexperience, she said, but she had never heard so many planes flying above the town at night. Her husband assured her that what she was hearing were maneuvers. There had been lots of exercises lately. All the same he threw a coat over his shoulders and stepped outside to take a closer look. He knew at once that this was real war. The very air was different; humming, shattered, thick with sour black smoke. The town’s main railway line was picked out by a rope of flame. Even the horizon had begun to redden, but its glow, to the west, was not the approaching dawn. Acting without orders, Kamenshchikov went to the airfield and took a plane up to meet the invaders at once, which is why, exceptionally among the hundreds of machines that were parked in neat formations as usual that night, his was brought down over the Bialystok marshes, and not destroyed on the ground. By mid-day on June 22, the Soviets had lost 1,200 planes. In Kamenshchikov’s own western district alone, 528 had been blown up like fairground targets by the German guns. Continues... Excerpted from Ivan's War by Catherine Merridale Copyright © 2007 by Catherine Merridale. Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site. Read more