Casino Moscow

I’ll admit, I picked up *Casino Moscow* expecting a dry recap of privatization policies. What I got instead was something closer to *The Wolf of Wall Street* meets *Dr. Strangelove*—if both were set in a lawless Moscow where men with briefcases full of cash outnumbered men with actual business plans. Kevin Stillwell’s narration is a masterclass in tonal balance: he delivers Brzezinski’s sharpest observations with the timing of a stand-up comic (listen for his deadpan reading of a Western consultant’s line, *“Well, we assumed the Russians understood markets”*), but he never undersells the tragedy beneath the farce. The production is crisp, though I’d have loved a slightly faster default speed—Stillwell’s pacing occasionally lingers a beat too long on statistical deep dives, which can test your focus during commutes. The book’s real strength lies in its refusal to romanticize *anyone*. The oligarchs aren’t geniuses; they’re opportunists who gamed a rigged system. The Western economists aren’t villains; they’re often just clueless, armed with textbooks that never accounted for the Kremlin’s brand of chaos. My one critique? Brzezinski’s reliance on anecdotes sometimes leaves bigger questions dangling—like how, exactly, ordinary Russians *felt* during these years beyond the broad strokes of betrayal. And while the audiobook’s structure jumps between threads with cinematic flair, it can feel disjointed if you’re not paying close attention. Still, for anyone fascinated by how power and money collide in the absence of rules, this is essential listening. Just don’t expect to feel optimistic about humanity by the end.