Getty J. Arch, Naumov Oleg. The Road to Terror. Stalin and the Self-Destruction of the Bolsheviks, 1932-39

Yale: Yale University Press, 2008.The Road to Terror is first and foremost a reference book. It contains 199 documents, taken from the Russian State Archive of Social and Political History (RGASPI) in Moscow and translated with astonishing sensitivity by Benjamin Sher . J. Arch Getty provides an eloquent commentary, it places the documents in context without taking away from their starring role. The choice of documents is unfailingly excellent: every piece brings some kind of insight, whether into the actions of the Party or of a given individual. Some, like the letter sent by defeated oppositionist Nikolai Bukharin to Stalin from his prison cell in 1937, are of exceptional interest.