Stalingrad, Vasily GrossmanIn April 1942, Hitler and Mussolini plan the huge offensive on the Eastern Front that will culminate in the greatest battle in human history. Hundreds of miles away, Pyotr Vavilov receives his call up papers and spends a final night with his wife and children in the hut that is his home. As war approaches, the Shaposhnikov family gathers for a meal: despite her age, Alexandra will soon become a refugee; Tolya will enlist in the reserves; Vera, a

stratified world

But for Alexis Hall

Or is the killer the rich

reading them is like watching one of those folk performances in which women dance while balancing pots on their heads

courting Chiang Kai-shek

real-life examples and layman's language to give you the tools to defend yourself from manipulation and to influence other people's actions or challenge their claims

that nothing mattered at all—and it intoxicated me

Peeling away layer after layer of personal history to reveal the torment of a fugitive spirit

a lonely war veteran

' Independent 'Everything he writes is addictively readable and clever

wily Odysseus

Bewildered by his strange new home on Park Avenue