The Last Empire

Serhii Plokhy is Mykhailo Hrushevsky Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University. A recipient of Harvard University's Walter Channing Cabot award and author of Yalta: The Price of Peace, Plokhy lives in Arlington, Massachusetts.

"A superb read: a deeply researched, indispensable reappraisal of the fall of the USSR that has the nail-biting drama of a movie, the gripping narrative and colorful personalities of a novel, and the analysis and original sources of a work of scholarship."—Simon Sebag Montefiore, BBC History Magazine (Best History Books of the Year)
"Using recently released documents, Plokhy traces in fascinating detail the complex events that led to the Soviet Union's implosion."—Foreign Affairs
"A fine-grained, closely reported, highly readable account of the upheavals of 1991."—Financial Times
"Plokhy makes a convincing case that the misplaced triumphalism of the senior Bush's administration led to the disastrous hubris of his son's."—Slate
"A fascinating and readable deep dive into the final half-year of the Soviet Union."—Sunday Telegraph (UK)
"A superb work of scholarship, vividly written, that challenges tired old assumptions with fresh material from East and West, as well as revealing interviews with many major players."—Spectator (UK)
"An incisive account of the five months leading up to the Union's dissolution.... His vibrant, fast-paced narrative style captures the story superbly."—
"Almost a day-by-day, blow-by-blow account of the actions and reactions of the main figures.... Very relevant to today's Ukrainian crisis...very well recounted."
—Literary Review (UK)
"Serhii Plokhy's great achievement in this wonderfully well-written account is to show that much of the triumphalist transatlantic view of the Soviet collapse is historiographical manure."—Times of London (UK)
—Times Literary Supplement
"A meticulously documented chronicle of the evil empire's demise.... [Plokhy] is the voice Ukrainians have been yearning for."—Ukrainian Weekly
"With Crimea annexed and eastern Ukraine starting to break away to Russia, The Last Empire may be the most timely book of the year."—National Review
"One of a rare breed: a well-balanced, unbiased book written on the fall of Soviet Union that emphasizes expert research and analysis."—Publishers Weekly
"[Plokhy] provides fascinating details (especially concerning Ukraine) about this fraught, historic time."—Kirkus