I mean, JFC, so much murdering.

Even the murderers responsible for the murdering end up getting murdered by the next wave of murderers.

And the danger of success: generals, scientists, writers...if you were good at your job you were probably gonna get murdered because of it.

I mean, it seems like people who were bad at their jobs got murdered too. Still...

And if you were related to or a friend of someone who got murdered? Well, then you were probably gonna be murdered as well.

Or tortured. Or imprisoned. Or enslaved. Or (and this seems like the best possible option) exiled.

Anyway, this book was a fascinating and terrifying examination of the humans who enabled and implemented massacre on a horrific scale.

Not a history of the Stalin-era Soviet Union, not a biography of Stalin, it’s a sketch of Koba and his eager/reluctant murderous peers.

Worth a read, if only to reinforce how easily humanity can slide into mass murder on an almost incomprehensible scale.

The book itself is at times a bit rushed and the narrative thread can get a bit confusing.

It also glosses over events outside of Stalin’s inner circles (Hitler, China, Korean War) & focuses on the lives of the Soviet "magnates".

But, as I said above, worth a read if you aren’t a student of Stalin-era Soviet history. *shudder*