In this series we ask authors, Guardian writers and readers to share what they have been reading recently. This month, recommendations include historical reads, from an excellent nonfiction book about the Soviet Union to a trilogy of novels about a fictionalised postwar Britain. Tell us in the comments what you have been reading.
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JR McNeill, historian and author
Mikhail Gorbachev, the central figure in the demise of the USSR, died at the end of August. By chance, I was reading Vladislav Zubok’s Collapse, which details Gorbachev’s doomed efforts to reform his sclerotic country. Lately, I’ve been reading armloads of excellent history books in connection with my role as chair of the jury for the Cundill history prize, and Zubok’s is among the best.
In Vladimir Putin’s assessment, the end of the USSR was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century”. In Washington, Putin’s catastrophe is often seen self-servingly as an American triumph. However that may be, the collapse was a defining development in contemporary history and one that resonates today given Putin’s war in Ukraine.
Zubok, born and raised in Moscow but now a historian at the London School of Economics, provides a deeply researched account beginning as Gorbachev was ascending the highest rungs of power. Zubok interviewed dozens of participants, mined memoirs, and scoured archives to build his story from the ground up with primary sources. The narrative occasionally tests the patience of hurried readers: “At 2.30 in the afternoon on 21 August, Marshal Yazov kissed his wife Emma goodbye …” But for those eager for an authoritatively detailed rendering of dramatic events, Zubok delivers.
JR McNeill is chair of the jury for the Cundill history prize, for which Collapse is shortlisted.
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Rebecca, Guardian reader
Here Again Now is beautifully, gently, sympathetically written by Okechukwo Nzelu. Never before have I underlined and copied so many quotes. It’s a moving, astounding and affirming novel.
Nzelu writes with pathos; it’s a very calm read. I’m a fast reader, but I read this very slowly, to savour every bit of its poetic, rhythmic phrase.
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Samson Kambalu, artist and author
I am reading George Mwase’s eccentric but insightful rendition of the Chilembwe Rising Strike a Blow and Die. I think it’s the best take on the uprising I have read so far while ushering my sculpture, Antelope, to Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth. The sculpture restages a 1914 photograph of the Baptist preacher and pan-Africanist John Chilembwe and the European missionary John Chorley, taken at the opening of Chilembwe’s new church in Nyasaland, now Malawi. In my depiction, Chilembwe is twice the size of Chorley. He wears a hat, defying the colonial rule that forbade Africans from wearing hats in front of white people. A year later, Chilembwe led an uprising against colonial rule in which he was killed, and his church, which had taken years to build, was destroyed by the colonial police.
The Jive Talker: Or, How to Get a British Passport by Samson Kambalu (September Books £12.99) is available in paperback now. To support the Guardian and Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
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Brenda, Guardian reader
I’ve just read the Small Change trilogy, by Jo Walton. The three volumes are Farthing, Ha’penny and Half a Crown. Walton has created a chillingly convincing set of novels about a fascist Britain, eerily relevant these days. And the trilogy has one of the neatest deus ex machinas ever, at the end.
