Fragile Empire

A lively, inside account of Putin's years of rule and the impending crisis that threatens his tsar-like regime "A beautifully written and very lively study of Russia that argues that the political order created by Vladimir Putin is stagnating-undermined by corruption and a failure to modernise economically."-Gideon Rachman, Financial Times "Ben Judah, a young freelance writer, paints a more journalistic-and more passionate-picture in Fragile Empire. He shuttles to and fro across Russia's vast terrain, finding criminals, liars, fascists and crooked politicians, as well as the occasional saintly figure."-The Economist From Kaliningrad on the Baltic to the Russian Far East, journalist Ben Judah has travelled throughout Russia and the former Soviet republics, conducting extensive interviews with President Vladimir Putin's friends, foes, and colleagues, government officials, business tycoons, mobsters, and ordinary Russian citizens.