Red Traitor

The new novel from a master of the Cold War thriller . . .<BR><BR>'This is Robert Harris storytelling territory' Daily Mail<BR>'Outstanding' Sunday Times<BR>'Tense, exciting and authentic' Charles Cumming, author of Judas 62<BR>'Stunning' The Times<BR>'Brilliantly plotted' John Sweeney, author of Killer in the Kremlin<BR>'A standout thriller' Financial Times<BR><BR>1963. In a desolate Russian penal colony, a radio broadcasts news of the killing of <BR>President John F. Kennedy . . .<BR><BR>Alexander Vasin's new posting as director of a brutal gulag camp is far from a promotion. This is where disgraced KGB officers are sent to disappear, quietly, and forgotten.<BR><BR>But when a violent revolt breaks out, Vasin must decide: run or die. So he runs. With him goes a mysterious prisoner - an individual who might hold the key to an extraordinarily dangerous secret: the identity of who really ordered Kennedy's assassination.<BR><BR>Racing from bleak Siberian wastelands to the grey streets of Soviet Moscow, Vasin needs to stay one step ahead of the most ruthless intelligence organization in the world in order to keep the most wanted man in Russia alive. And with his loyalty, morality and patriotic duty tested to the limits, he will face the ultimate choice: fall in line, or die fighting the system . . .<BR><BR>Weaving together a critical moment in history with the cut-throat machinations of Soviet politics, this tautly told, nail-bitingly atmospheric novel is a superb Cold War thriller.

Winner of the Pushkin House Book Prize 2023*A Telegraph Book of the Year*A Times Best Book of Summer 2023*Shortlisted for the Parliamentary Book Awards*An astonishing investigation into the start of the Russo-Ukrainian war - from the corridors of the Kremlin to the trenches of Mariupol.The Russo-Ukrainian War is the most serious geopolitical crisis since the Second World War - and yet at the heart of the conflict is a mystery. Vladimir Putin apparently lurched from a calculating, subtle master of opportunity to a reckless gambler, putting his regime - and Russia itself - at risk of destruction. Why?Drawing on over 25 years' experience as a correspondent in Moscow, as well as his own family ties to Russia and Ukraine, journalist Owen Matthews takes us through the poisoned historical roots of the conflict, into the Covid bubble where Putin conceived his invasion plans in a fog of paranoia about Western threats, and finally into the inner circle around Ukrainian president and unexpected war hero Volodimir Zelensky.Using the accounts of current and former insiders from the Kremlin and its propaganda machine, the testimony of captured Russian soldiers and on-the-ground reporting from Russia and Ukraine, Overreach tells the story not only of the war's causes but how the first six months unfolded.With its panoramic view, Overreach is an authoritative, unmissable record of a conflict that shocked Europe to its core.