wasoxygen bought me a copy of Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. That is high on the list. Just an incredible read with fantastic characters. I have been working my way through Winston Churchill's five book account of WWII. I've read three so far. Given that he is relating his first hand experience of leading the UK through the Nazi onslaught, there really isn't anything else like it. The books contain many letters between Churchill, his Generals, Ministers, and other Heads of State. It's very interesting to get a sense of their frame of mind when so much was uncertain.
The description of the book sounds very interesting, and I value your opinion enough for it to form my desire to read it. Thank you for letting me know of the book. Thanks for letting me know of the Churchill's books, too. I'm not sure whether I could ever bring myself to read something like that, but the premise of it sounds interesting. Indeed, if someone in the higher-ups of the governments involved would be able to tell about the Second World War, I'd be inclined to read it. It's too bad Mein Kampf is banned in Russia: despite the reputation of its author, it is a historical book which, much like Churchill's, sheds light on the second world-wide armed conflict.wasoxygen bought me a copy of Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. That is high on the list. Just an incredible read with fantastic characters.
I would recommend reading historians who have written about Mein Kampf way more than the source material. I tried once. It was very difficult to make heads or tails of. Mostly it appeared to be the collected ravings of an extreme narcissist, and to pick out the actual policy bits requires more study than I was willing to put in. Fortunately, the book itself has been dissected in great detail over the years, and there are resources out there to get a glimpse of Hitler's political theory. I will highly recommend a new book on the topic, Black Earth by Timothy Snyder. It's by far the most insightful book I've ever read on the topic of Nazi thinking, how the Holocaust actually happened, and what the aims of the Nazi regime were vis-a-vis Jews and Slavs. I doubt it's been translated into Russian yet, as it's very new, but if you're comfortable reading it in English, it's a worthwhile read.
Thanks for the advice. I would still like to take a look at Mein Kampf out of curiosity, but I'll follow your advice. I've just put Black Earth into my Amazon wishlist. Amusingly enough, there was another book with the same title by a different author that told, instead, about either of the Russian revolutions.