A dawn of the millennium party in Poland, a country celebrating its liberation from the Soviet yoke. Twenty years later, another party with some old friends purposefully absent either by the author's or their own volition. These events bookend Applebaum's awakening to the rise of authoritarianism in her adopted country, in Europe and elsewhere. Her writing is very fluent and her confessions startingly personal. She admits she should have questioned her former friends earlier and harder.
(Jeremy Miller - bwl 98 Autumn 2020 ) |
