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by: Amy Knight
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 947
EAN: 9780809097036
ISBN: 0809097036
Label: Hill & Wang
Manufacturer: Hill & Wang
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 336
Publication Date: 2000-05
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Sales Rank: 815356
Studio: Hill & Wang
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
An exciting analysis of Russia's crime of the century, the assassination of Stalin's greatest rival.
The 1934 murder of the charismatic politician Sergei Kirov sparked Stalin's brutal purges, and speculation about it still fascinates the Russians. Who killed Kirov, and why? In Russia, conspiracy theories about Kirov have abounded, and scholars throughout the world have tackled various pieces of the story--but definitive evidence has eluded them. Now Amy Knight has combed the recently opened Russian archives to reconstruct this fascinating crime and analyze its effect on the Russian people. The result is at once an intriguing murder mystery and a major piece of scholarship that sheds new light on the terrors of Stalin.
Amazon.com Review:
In contrast to the brusque, standoffish Stalin, Leningrad party chief and Politburo member Sergei Kirov was charismatic and approachable--a real muzhnik, or man of the people. His rise through the ranks of the communist party to become the prize orator of Stalin's regime was aided by his popularity and his devotion to the cause. The question of who killed Kirov has perplexed Russian bureaucrats and historians alike since the apparent murder took place in December 1934. Although the Stalin regime immediately accused and brutally killed alleged suspects--and then used the murders as a catalyst for massive purges of its enemies--lack of definitive evidence continues to shroud the case in mystery and keeps it rife with speculation to this day. In Who Killed Kirov? The Kremlin's Greatest Mystery, Amy Knight draws on compelling new evidence and presents the most convincing account to date of the Kirov murder and the momentous events surrounding it.
In order fully to understand the murder, according to Knight, the reader must learn what kind of man Kirov was, how he rose to power within the Soviet political system, and how Stalin came to dominate that system. Consequently, she devotes much of the book to Kirov's personal story, his role in forging the Bolshevik regime, and his relationships with key party leaders. Although Kirov's murder and its tragic aftermath remain the narrative's focal point, Knight successfully broadens her readers' understanding of the entire Stalinist era.
A research associate at George Washington University and author of two additional studies of Russian politics, Knight supplements her 270-page study with maps, illustrations, chronologies, a glossary of names, diagrams of the Soviet political hierarchy, and ample notes. Well researched and thoroughly documented, Who Killed Kirov? remains accessible to the general reader. --Bertina Loeffler Sedlack
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Best for the casual reader
It should be clear from the sensational title that Knight's book is aimed at those with but a casual interest in Russian history. A scan of the reviews submitted bears that out; it appears that those with great familiarity with Russian history pan the book, while those with passing knowledge rave about it.
I agree with all those who take exception to the title; this is more a biography of Kirov than it is a "whodunnit?" Knight's treatment of Kirov's life and times is dry at times but ... Read More
Rating:  - A Good Read
Despite a slow start, and having to get used to the author's somewhat patronizing writing style, I enjoyed the book and found myself thinking about it for days after I finished reading it. I had known that Kirov was something of a maverick in the context of a Soviet leader, however I had no idea he was so outspoken in his speeches, letters, etc. towards Stalin. Granted his hands were by no means clean, however he appears to have had more of a " human face " and connection with the poeple than ... Read More
Rating:  - Who doesn't know?
Unless as one writer suggests, new documentation with the credibility to give the information credence is introduced, this book offers very little in any event. There were some photographs that I had not seen in other books, and the floor plan and the alleged positioning of security was interesting. For this book to suggest this killing has the same mystery surrounding the Kennedy assassination is absurd.
There are many who believe that Kennedy was not solely the victim of Oswald, and ... Read More
Rating: - What's wrong with Occam's Razor?
Anyone interested in Soviet history will be interested in this book. The author has produced a readable and competent account of Kirov's life, gathers and surveys what has been written on the mystery of his death, and provides interesting photographs and a map of the 3rd floor of the Smolny where the killing took place.
Unfortunately she dismisses - almost casually, as did Conquest - what is the most simple, and therefore most probable, explanation of the reason for the killing.
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Rating: - A misleading title
If this book carried a proper title, like "A Stalinist Life," or something like that, it would probably be read only by a handful of people. That would be a shame, because the book is valuable as a rich biography of a Stalinist cadre and as a readable and informative entry into a difficult period of modern history. But as a key to the mystery of Kirov's assassination, or even as a contribution to the literature on that murder, the book is a huge disappointment. It does not merit the great trumpeting ... Read More
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