Revelatory and instructive... [a] beautifully written and accessible book -- David Aaronovitch * The Times *
There is not a dull sentence in this scintillating and wry account of the global impact of Maoism -- Michael Burleigh * Evening Standard, *Book of the Week* *
Wonderful -- Andrew Marr * New Statesman *
An exciting, alternative history of the 20th century that deviates from the well-rehearsed narrative that relays between Washington and Moscow -- Tanjil Rashid * Financial Times *
A landmark work giving a global panorama of Mao's ideology filled with historic events and enlivened by striking characters -- Jonathan Fenby, author of The Penguin History of Modern China
Julia Lovell has given us a masterful corrective to the greatest misconception about today's China. For too long, visitors who marveled at China's new luxuries and capitalist zeal assumed that Maoism had gone the way of its creator. That was a mistake. Lovell's account - eloquent, engrossing, intelligent - not only explains why Xi Jinping has revived some of Mao's techniques, but also why Mao's playbook for the People's War retains an intoxicating and tragic appeal to marginalized people the world over -- Evan Osnos, author of The Age of Ambition
Lovell takes us on an exhilarating journey, tracing the spread of Maoist theories across South-east Asia and then Africa, ending up in today's China... The historical sweep of this book is impressive -- Christopher Coker * Literary Review *
Lovell has produced a work which may well be the most harrowing, fascinating and occasionally hilarious book on the subject thus far -- Stuart Kelly * Scotland on Sunday *
Lovell is an accomplished storyteller with a nuanced and sophisticated understanding of China's relationship with itself and the world -- Isabel Hilton * Prospect *
Lovell has a gift for compressing long and convoluted histories via just the right stories, characters, moments, and statistics... In vivid, often grim detail, Lovell shows us how and why Maoism has proven better, both inside and outside China, at attacking state infrastructure than building it up * Daily Telegraph *
Lovell breaks new ground and does so in a wonderfully well-written account packed with horrors, extraordinary characters and occasionally macabre humour -- Chris Patten * Tablet *
Lovells's descriptions of...global strands of Maoism are well-researched and colourful * Economist *
Highly readable and well-researched book... timely -- David Priestland * New Statesman *
A fascinating account of the influence of Maoism, during the cold war and beyond -- Gideon Rachman * Financial Times, *Books of the Year* *
[A] superb and chilling study -- Dominic Sandbrook * Sunday Times, *Books of the Year* *
A fascinating and timely work on one of the most influential and disruptive strands of Marxist thought: that of Mao Zedong... the book reveals the relevance of Mao to our current populist age * London Review of Economics, *Books of the Year* *
