Edwin Krijgsman Książki

A book that pulls back the curtain and takes us into the secret world of professional cycling.

A mother shares her life story with her long-lost daughter in this historical novel set against the backdrop of a community divided by Italian Fascism and German Nazism. In the village of Curon, seventeen-year-old Trina aspires to be a teacher, but her dreams are shattered when Mussolini's regime abolishes German as the teaching language in 1923. Defying the oppressive Italianization efforts, she joins a clandestine network of schools, risking capture. Amidst fear and uncertainty, Trina finds love with Erich, an orphaned young man and her father’s helper. However, her life takes another turn when Hitler's Germany introduces the "Great Option" in 1939, prompting divisions within the community as residents decide whether to join the Reich or remain loyal to Italy. Those who choose to stay, like Trina and her family, face accusations of treachery and abuse. The tension escalates until one day Trina returns home to discover her daughter is missing. Inspired by the haunting image of the bell tower rising from Lake Resia, this poignant narrative intricately weaves historical events with the personal struggles of its characters.

This is the chilling account of how a low-level, small-minded KGB operative ascended to the Russian presidency and, in an astonishingly short time, destroyed years of progress and made his country once more a threat to her own people and to the world. Handpicked by the "family" surrounding an ailing and increasingly unpopular Boris Yeltsin, Vladimir Putin seemed like a perfect choice for the oligarchy to shape according to its own designs. Suddenly the boy who had stood in the shadows was a public figure, and his popularity soared. Russia and an infatuated West were determined to see the progressive leader of their dreams, even as he seized control of media, sent political rivals and critics into exile or to the grave, and smashed the country's fragile electoral system, concentrating power in the hands of his cronies. As a journalist living in Moscow, Masha Gessen experienced this history firsthand, and she has drawn on sources no other writer has tapped.--From publisher description.