The Russian Revolution

A New History

By: Sean McMeekin

Narrated by: Pete Larkin

Length: 15 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's summary

From an award-winning scholar comes this definitive, single-volume history that illuminates the tensions and transformations of the Russian Revolution.

In The Russian Revolution, acclaimed historian Sean McMeekin traces the events which ended Romanov rule, ushered the Bolsheviks into power, and introduced Communism to the world. Between 1917 and 1922, Russia underwent a complete and irreversible transformation.

Taking advantage of the collapse of the Tsarist regime in the middle of World War I, the Bolsheviks staged a hostile takeover of the Russian Imperial Army, promoting mutinies and mass desertions of men in order to fulfill Lenin's program of turning the "imperialist war" into civil war. By the time the Bolsheviks had snuffed out the last resistance five years later, over 20 million people had died, and the Russian economy had collapsed so completely that Communism had to be temporarily abandoned. Still, Bolshevik rule was secure, owing to the new regime's monopoly on force, enabled by illicit arms deals signed with capitalist neighbors such as Germany and Sweden who sought to benefit-politically and economically-from the revolutionary chaos in Russia.

Drawing on scores of previously untapped files from Russian archives and a range of other repositories in Europe, Turkey, and the United States, McMeekin delivers exciting, groundbreaking research about this turbulent era. The first comprehensive history of these momentous events in two decades, The Russian Revolution combines cutting-edge scholarship and a fast-paced narrative to shed new light on one of the most significant turning points of the 20th century.

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

©2017 Sean McMeekin (P)2017 Hachette Audio

Great wealth of info.

Excellent wealth of information. A clear anti communist bias from the writer. Nonetheless covers all major details of transition from monarchy to communism thoroughly.

A skeptical account of the Russian Revolution

This book is a lively account of the Russian revolution. Much of it is from the point of you diplomacy and high policy. The sociological discussion and discussion of the organization of the political parties is not the emphasis here; it is more “high politics”, but well done and thorough. Neither Stalinists no Trotskyist will like this account, but it is equally distant from the outlook of cold warriors. The author is skeptical about the political machinations of all sides, and for this, I commend him.

Enlightening

With so much of the Russian Revolution/history still shrouded in mythos - largely due to questionable information, this book definitely helped shed some light on it.

Very informative.

This book dispelled a lot of presumptions I had about the fall of the Czar and the rise of Soviet Communism. It’s a really sad story but important to be knowledgeable of.

Incredible Book

An unbiased account of one of the most controversial and important events of the last century.

History and all its parts

Some parts more interesting to me than others but the theme is great and important for understanding Western history as well as Russian and Slovak.

Russian Revolution informative perspectve

Full Disclosure:

I recently read a book entitled "The Secrets We Kept" - about a group of women in the 1950's CIA - who started out as admins and then 'graduated' to Courier. The background construct was the CIA's backing of a plot to public "Dr. Zhivago" within the Soviet Union - to show the impacts of the Russian Revolution.

This led me to listen to Dr. Zhivago itself - a classic - the Russian "Gone With The Wind"....

I'm still finishing up Dr. Z - I realized that I didn't have much context or perspective about the Russian Revolution itself - Reds, Whites, Korensky, the Cheka and etc.

So that leads me to Sean McMeekin's "The Russian Revolution"....

Review:

Learned a good deal of history - but also some points are extremely relevant in today's US Society.
Lenin - when he returned to Petrograd - had $ from the Germans - one of the first things he did was use this German $ to buy a printing press - and to publish his own newspaper/propoganda - which influenced the workers and local Army cadre.

Another learning - the Bolsheviks were originally a small (revolutionary) party - yet with a small number of totally committed ruthless people (mostly men) - they 'won' the war against the competition. I've recently read books about the Wiemar Republic and how in the context of Germany's Economic and Political crisis - eventually Hitler came to power. Something to think about - not exactly parallels - but something to be learned there.

Very listenable - very detailed - provides a great historical perspective.

Carl Gallozzi
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overall very nice

it's a good book, the amount of information for someone new to the topic is sometimes somewhat overwhelming but overall very informative the performance is nice as well.

Audio version challenging with Russian names

I think I might have been better off reading this in print version. The story is compelling and very informative, but I struggled somewhat with keeping track of all the Russian characters names in the audio version.

must read

This book should be read by all would be Champaign Socialists who think that communism and socialism could work.