{"title":"Victor Sebestyen","description":"\u003cp\u003eDelve into the captivating historical narratives of Victor Sebestyen. Explore the lives and times of influential figures and pivotal moments that have shaped our world. Perfect for history enthusiasts!\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"twelve-days-book-victor-sebestyen-9780753822142","title":"Twelve Days","description":"The defining moment of the Cold War: 'The beginning of the end of the Soviet empire.' (Richard Nixon)  The Hungarian Revolution in 1956 is a story of extraordinary bravery in a fight for freedom, and of ruthless cruelty in suppressing a popular dream. A small nation, its people armed with a few rifles and petrol bombs, had the will and courage to rise up against one of the world's superpowers.   The determination of the Hungarians to resist the Russians astonished the West. People of all kinds, throughout the free  world, became involved in the cause. 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From the Prague Spring to Lech Walesa's Solidarity and the fall of the Berlin Wall, the tighter the grip of the communist bloc, the more irresistible the popular demand for freedom.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49511812170001,"sku":"GOR001282377","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49606671597841,"sku":"GOR003621774","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49731467706641,"sku":"NGR9780753822142","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50120864891153,"sku":"CIN0753822148G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50913983791377,"sku":"CIN0753822148VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50988919324945,"sku":"GOR008021541","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52416116031761,"sku":"GOR004068468","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ LIKE_NEW \/ SBYB","offer_id":52889784811793,"sku":"CIN0753822148LN","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0753822148.jpg?v=1751361433"},{"product_id":"revolution-1989-book-victor-sebestyen-9780753827093","title":"Revolution 1989","description":"'A compelling and illuminating account of a great drama in the history of our times which showed once again that ordinary men and women really can change the world' Jonathan Dimbleby, MAIL ON SUNDAY  For more than 40 years after the Second World War the Iron Curtain divided Europe physically, with 300 km of walls and barbed wire fences; ideologically, between communism and capitalism; psychologically, between people imprisoned under totalitarian dictatorships and their neighbours enjoying democratic freedoms; and militarily, by two mighty, distrustful power blocs, still fighting the cold war. At the start of 1989, ten European nations were still Soviet vassal states. By the end of the year, one after another, they had thrown off communism, declared national independence, and embarked on the road to democracy.   One of history's most brutal empires was on its knees. Poets who had been languishing in jails became vice presidents. When the Berlin Wall fell on a chilly November night it seemed as though the open wounds of the cruel twentieth century would at last begin to heal. The Year of Revolutions appeared as a beacon of hope for oppressed people elsewhere who dared to dream that they too could free themselves.   In a dizzying few months of almost entirely peaceful revolutions the people's will triumphed over tyranny. An entire way of life was swept away. 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Drawing on new archival material and many interviews, Sebestyen analyzes these major postwar decisions and others as he discusses the economic collapse, starvation, ethnic cleansing, and displacement that followed the war. 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In this new account  Victor Sebestyen, who was brought out of Hungary as an infant, draws on  fresh evidence  from Moscow, Washington and Budapest, as well as interviews  with participants,  that  brings new light on a story  that will always be an inspiration  to those who hate tyranny.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49533043638545,"sku":"GOR004068783","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49684339523857,"sku":"GOR003077714","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":50156567855377,"sku":"CIN0297847317A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50341869060369,"sku":"CIN0297847317VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50481383899409,"sku":"CIN0297847317G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0297847317.jpg?v=1751429962"},{"product_id":"1946-the-making-of-the-modern-world-book-victor-sebestyen-9780230758001","title":"1946: The Making of the Modern World","description":"With the end of the Second World War, a new world was born. 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Told through the prism of Lenin's key relationships, Sebestyen's lively biography casts a new light on the Russian Revolution, one of the great turning points of modern history.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49538864316689,"sku":"GOR009050790","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49559565336849,"sku":"GOR008713934","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49880838242577,"sku":"GOR008110577","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52583031275793,"sku":"GOR011928526","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1474600441.jpg?v=1751449537"},{"product_id":"lenin-book-victor-sebestyen-9781101871638","title":"Lenin","description":"Victor Sebestyen's riveting biography of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin--the first major biography in English in nearly two decades--is not only a political examination of one of the most important historical figures of the twentieth century but also a fascinating portrait of Lenin the man. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBrought up in comfort and with a passion for hunting and fishing, chess, and the English classics, Lenin was radicalized after the execution of his brother in 1887. Sebestyen traces the story from Lenin's early years to his long exile in Europe and return to Petrograd in 1917 to lead the first Communist revolution in history. Uniquely, Sebestyen has discovered that throughout Lenin's life his closest relationships were with his mother, his sisters, his wife, and his mistress. The long-suppressed story told here of the love triangle that Lenin had with his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, and his beautiful, married mistress and comrade, Inessa Armand, reveals a more complicated character than that of the coldly one-dimensional leader of the Bolshevik Revolution. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith Lenin's personal papers and those of other leading political figures now available, Sebestyen gives is new details that bring to life the dramatic and gripping story of how Lenin seized power in a coup and ran his revolutionary state. The product of a violent, tyrannical, and corrupt Russia, he chillingly authorized the deaths of thousands of people and created a system based on the idea that political terror against opponents was justified for a greater ideal. An old comrade what had once admired him said that Lenin desired the good . . . but created evil. 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East-West rivalry and a cruelly divided continent seemed to be unalterable facts of life. Few statesmen, diplomats, soldiers or thinkers imagined these certainties would change in their lifetimes. At the start of 1989, ten European nations were still Soviet vassal states. By the end of the year, one after another, they had thrown off communism, declared national independence, and embarked on the road to democracy. One of history's most brutal empires was on its knees. Poets who had been languishing in jails became vice presidents. When the Berlin Wall fell on a chilly November night it seemed as though the open wounds of the cruel twentieth century would at last begin to heal. The Year of Revolutions appeared as a beacon of hope for oppressed people elsewhere who dared to dream that they too could free themselves. In a dizzying few months of almost entirely peaceful revolutions the people's will triumphed over tyranny. An entire way of life was swept away along with a half dozen incompetent, corrupt and at times vicious dictatorships. It happened with little violence, apart from a few days in Romania. Now, twenty years on, Victor Sebestyen reassesses this decisive moment in modern history.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49540084039953,"sku":"GOR002221142","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49655492542737,"sku":"GOR002091224","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51242602103057,"sku":"GOR006038134","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51513619185937,"sku":"GOR011082515","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/029785223X.jpg?v=1751435011"},{"product_id":"russian-revolution-book-victor-sebestyen-9781800244719","title":"The Russian Revolution","description":"An illustrated account of one of the most pivotal events in modern history – the Russian revolution of 1917.  In the early years of the twentieth century, Imperial Russia was an ethnically diverse empire, stretching from Ukraine and Belarus in the west to the Bering Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk in the Far East. At the head of this profoundly dysfunctional polity was Tsar Nicholas II, whose Romanov successors had ruled Russia since the start of the seventeenth century with a lethal mixture of domestic cruelty, expansionist energy and reactionary incompetence – interspersed with occasional reformist spasms.  By early 1917, Russia was unreformable, and the tsar's authority irreparably damaged. In March of that year, Nicholas II abdicated and the tsarist system was overthrown. The provisional government installed in its stead to organise democratic elections lasted just eight chaotic months before being ousted by Lenin's Bolsheviks in the October Revolution.  Writing with crisp immediacy, Sebestyen narrates an unprecedented era of political and social convulsion. The Russian Revolution changed the course of history, and, more than a century later, their backwash continues to be deeply felt across the world.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49570154447121,"sku":"GOR013266483","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49740395970833,"sku":"NGR9781800244719","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50298025246993,"sku":"GOR013246306","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1800244711.jpg?v=1751433957"},{"product_id":"1946-book-victor-sebestyen-9781101910283","title":"1946","description":"In 1946, Victor Sebestyen creates a taut, panoramic narrative and takes us to meetings that changed the world: to Berlin in July 1945, when Truman tells Stalin that we have successfully tested the bomb; to Ye'nan, China, in January 1946, when General George Marshall tells the Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong that Americans won't send troops to China, assuring that the Communists will attain power; to Delhi, India, in April 1946, when U.K. cabinet members tell Pandit Nehur and Mahatma Gandhi that the British will leave India within a few months, ending two centuries of British imperialism. Drawing on new archival material and many interviews, Sebestyen analyzes these major postwar decisions and others as he discusses the economic collapse, starvation, ethnic cleansing, and displacement that followed the war. 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