'Close to a miracle... The Shortest History of the Soviet Union is an immensely readable overview of the entire history of the Soviet Union from 1917 to 1991, full of anecdotes and lively detail, but also meeting the highest academic standards' Slavoj ŽižekThe U.S.S.R. A nation that arrived in the world accidentally, and departed unexpectedly. Over a century after the Russian Revolution, the tumul...