October 15, 2022 We'll Swim After Victory Our correspondent was offered a business trip to Odesa, Ukraine. He took it and brought this back.
July 15, 2022 Moscow-Kharkiv: Russia On An Express Train to Hell As a famous Russian writer recounts, many Russians are pretending that nothing is happening. They’re trying not to discuss what’s going on just a four-hour train ride to Hell away.
May 01, 2009 The Deportation of Peoples This is the 55th anniversary of the peak period of Soviet deportation of national groups.
April 28, 2023 Snapshots from Small-Town Russia A courageous teacher, fired for anti-war views, shares the words that many are thinking but few dare say.
May 01, 2011 Trekking In Partisan Footsteps Eastern Crimea was a center for partisan activity during the Great Patriotic War. In honor of the May Day holiday, we trek through this wild realm along the Black Sea.
June 01, 2024 The Path to Foreign Agenthood A grassroots organization fighting for the rights of mobilized soldiers has been declared a foreign agent.
May 23, 2023 Thank You For Your Service Russian hypersonic rocket scientists have been accused of treason.
February 27, 2023 A Wall of Resistance A Russian shopkeeper's picture went viral after using the walls of his shop to express opposition to the invasion of Ukraine.
March 07, 2008 Statistics and Damn Lies Robert Coalson (RFE/RL) has just published a superb summary of some of the brazen election abuses during last December's Duma elections in Russia. It would be funny if it were not so sad.
September 27, 2019 Go, Go to Ukraine to Find Gogol Small-town Ukraine shows a different side of one the famous "Russian" writer.
December 19, 2019 Tik-Tok Goes the Progress Clock Political entities and 97-year-old veterans on social media, transgender marriage, and sushi at office parties show Russia is ready for 2020
May 01, 2013 Stargorod: A Novel in Many Voices Stargorod is a mid-sized provincial city that exists only in Russian metaphorical space. It has its roots in Gogol, and Ilf and Petrov, and is a place far from Moscow, but close to Russian hearts. It is a place of mystery and normality, of provincial innocence and Black Earth wisdom. Strange, inexplicable things happen in Stargorod. So do good things. And bad things. A lot like life everywhere, one might say. Only with a heavy dose of vodka, longing and mystery. Fiction
October 09, 2011 Jews in Service to the Tsar Benjamin Disraeli advised, “Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.” With Jews in Service to the Tsar, Lev Berdnikov offers us 28 biographies spanning five centuries of Russian Jewish history, and each portrait opens a new window onto the history of Eastern Europe’s Jews, illuminating dark corners and challenging widely-held conceptions about the role of Jews in Russian history. History Nonfiction
November 16, 2011 Russian Rules From the shores of the White Sea to Moscow and the Northern Caucasus, Russian Rules is a high-speed thriller based on actual events, terrifying possibilities, and some really stupid decisions. Fiction
Tolstoy Bilingual This compact, yet surprisingly broad look at the life and work of Tolstoy spans from one of his earliest stories to one of his last, looking at works that made him famous and others that made him notorious. Bilingual Books Fiction Language Learning
October 31, 2024 Far & Away ~ Tales from Rural Russia 33 original stories about modern (and not so modern) life in rural Russia. Fiction
September 20, 2025 How Russia Got That Way A fast-paced crash course in Russian history, from Norsemen to Navalny, that explores the ways the Kremlin uses history to achieve its ends. Nonfiction
February 01, 2010 Fish This mesmerizing novel from one of Russia’s most important modern authors traces the life journey of a selfless Russian everywoman. In the wake of the Soviet breakup, inexorable forces drag Vera across the breadth of the Russian empire. Facing a relentless onslaught of human and social trials, she swims against the current of life, countering adversity and pain with compassion and hope, in many ways personifying Mother Russia’s torment and resilience amid the Soviet disintegration. Literature Fiction
November 01, 2012 Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture. Nonfiction
May 01, 2015 Bears in the Caviar Bears in the Caviar is a hilarious and insightful memoir by a diplomat who was “present at the creation” of US-Soviet relations. Charles Thayer headed off to Russia in 1933, calculating that if he could just learn Russian and be on the spot when the US and USSR established relations, he could make himself indispensable and start a career in the foreign service. Remarkably, he pulled it of. Nonfiction
June 01, 2016 Driving Down Russia's Spine The story of the epic Spine of Russia trip, intertwining fascinating subject profiles with digressions into historical and cultural themes relevant to understanding modern Russia. Nonfiction
Turgenev Bilingual A sampling of Ivan Turgenev's masterful short stories, plays, novellas and novels. Bilingual, with English and accented Russian texts running side by side on adjoining pages. Bilingual Books Fiction Language Learning
May 01, 2024 Dostoyevsky Bilingual Bilingual series of short, lesser known, but highly significant works that show the traditional view of Dostoyevsky as a dour, intense, philosophical writer to be unnecessarily one-sided. Bilingual Books Language Learning
