Edward H. Judge

This is a textbook narrative of the Cold War that starts in the late 19th century with the rise of Marxism (the beginning of the book hurries from the late 19th century through the late 1930s rather briefly) and continues through the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. It is fairly easy to read and seems to be relatively comprehensive, if compressed; I know a good bit about this period of history already and I learned a number of details and trends that were new to me. Its tone is somewhat odd: neither pro-Western nor pro-Communist, nor exactly detached and objective, it consistently describes people and actions in cynical terms, as if the historical actors were always play-acting and never doing what they really wanted to or revealing what they really thought. One strength of the book is that it includes an appendix of a careful selection of over 90 primary source documents (running to 200 pages)--speeches, interviews, newspaper articles and editorials, diplomatic reports, treaties, press releases, etc.--so that the reader can read a lot of this material for him- or herself within the covers of the same book, without having to track all this material down separately.

One thing that disappointed me was the lack of notes, sources, or suggestions for further reading; however, it turns out that the publisher decided to post the authors’ list of suggestions for further reading (running to 16 pages) on the publisher’s Web site, so that lack in the printed book is apparently not due to the authors. Also, it’s worth reiterating that this is fairly straight narrative; there is no exploration of historiography or comparison of alternate interpretations. The book does end in a short concluding chapter that briefly looks at some of the major themes of the Cold War. All in all, a decent and readable introduction to the Cold War.… (mehr)

A thoughtful and well-researched account of a once-infamous, now-forgotten pogrom in what is now Moldova, which claimed scores of Jewish lives. The author does a good job explaining the forces at work that lead to the pogrom and determining just how complicit the government was in the tragedy. I do, however, think the book was a bit dry. There could potentially have been exciting glimpses of the action itself — certainly the author had the resources, in the form of court testimony.

I would recommend this for people interested in Russian Jewish history, but not for the general reader.… (mehr)