Leon Aron is one of the most astute observers of Russian politics in the world today. Everything he writes is simply 'must read' material. His essays have the rare ability to combine sharp analytical statements with meticulous research. To have his articles from the last two decades collected in a single volume is an invaluable resource for any serious student of Russian politics, economics, and culture.
— Michael McFaul, Special assistant for Russian affairs to President Barack Obama; the author of From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin's Russia
“Leon Aron is one of our very best witnesses to, and analysts of, the new Russia. His collected essays track two decades of the changes within Russia itself and in Russian and Western opinion of them. But they also present a consistent Aron voice that deserves to be heard—judicious, broad (as much at home in literature or the restaurant scene as in arms control or privatization), sanely optimistic, and invariably rendered in graceful yet unpretentious prose.”
— Timothy Colton, Harvard University