The Ice Walk: Surviving the Soviet Break-up and the New Russia

Helen Womack lived in Russia under three Kremlin leaders. In all that time, what really changed and what remained essentially the same? Better equipped than most Westerners to answer that question, Helen draws not only on her own experience but on the eyewitness accounts of ordinary Russians, who struggled to survive and make sense of the historic changes in their country after Communism came to an end. Helen saw it all: Gorbachev's perestroika, Yeltsin's market reforms and Putin's return to order. Forced to leave Russia in 2015, Helen watched the slide towards war in Ukraine from Budapest and has described it in this new, updated edition of The Ice Walk. The title refers to the recurring pattern of Russian politics. Like the weather, the political climate goes in cycles. The thaw offers hope but comes with dangers; the freeze brings stability but also a shut-down. Winter is long and miserable but in the cold and dark lives the seed of spring.