Anthony Beevor, a specialist in the 2nd World War, gives us here a great chronological summary of this period. The pace is good and it actually reads like a novel. Most of this book is its objectivity because a lot of books on this period are often very subjective insisting too heavily on the dichotomy between the belligerents largely blurring of responsibilities. The most striking example is Operation Barbarossa in which the author demonstrates the savagery of Soviet troops and the NKVD to their own populations.
