Dmitry Glukhovsky. We. Diary of a Fall

"We. A Diary of a Fall" is Dmitry Glukhovsky's attempt to answer the question, "What happened to Russia?" Journalistic notes and gossip columns, each merely a reaction to news and the minutiae of life, form a history of the Putin regime from 2012 to the war in Ukraine. From the present day, moving step by step from event to event, Glukhovsky shows how freedom and democracy disappeared, how the security forces became brutal, how the ghosts of the USSR returned, how state ideology became militarized, and how the country prepared for war. The author comments on each text from the perspective of 2024, examining himself and his own perceptions as historical objects. "We. A Diary of a Fall" reveals with disconcerting clarity how much we refused to see while Russia methodically and consistently moved toward militant tyranny.