Wizard of the Kremlin

He was known as the Wizard of the Kremlin. The enigmatic Vadim Baranov was a TV producer before becoming political advisor to Putin. After he resigns from this position, legends about him multiply, without anyone being able to distinguish truth from fiction. Until one night, he tells his story to the narrator of this book…


Welcome to the heart of Russian power, where sycophants and oligarchs have been engaging in open warfare, and where Vadim, now the regime’s main spin doctor, turns an entire country into an avant-garde political stage. Yet Vadim is not as ambitious as the others. Entangled in the increasingly dark secret workings of the regime he has contributed to build, he will do anything to get out, guided by the memory of his grandfather, an eccentric aristocrat who survived the Revolution, and the mesmerizing, merciless Ksenia, whom he has fallen in love with.


From the war in Chechnya to the invasion of Ukraine, The Wizard of the Kremlin is a great novel on contemporary Russia, and a sobering meditation on power, which takes the reader behind the scenes of the Putin era.

Review: ‘A staggering account of the mental makeup and aggressive logic of Vladimir Putin… A story of great literary and historical force that you must read if you want to understand what, from here, seems incomprehensible’ – Liberation

‘A highly economical, well documented pageturner, describing twenty years in the corridors of Russian power, with a simple, seductive style and unmatched realism’ – Frederic Beigbeder

‘You cannot put this book down… Fascinating and suffocating. A clinical analysis of the art of authoritarian rule’ – France Inter

‘An absolutely extraordinary novel… You feel you’re sitting on a sofa next to Putin, that you are inside his head’ – Patricia Martin

‘Of course this novel sheds a revealing light on current geopolitical events. But it will outlive them thanks to its unwavering lucidity and sparkling style’ – Le Monde des Livres

Format: Paperback
Pages: 304
Imprint: PUSHKIN PRESS
Publication date: 01/01/2024