I'm wanting to get a book for my brother about the life of Stalin. From his rise to power to the start of the cold war and was wondering if anybody had any suggestions.
Well, Stephen Kotkin's two-volumes of his planned three volume set has taken Stalin up to June 1941. Kotkin's books will be one of the definitive Stalin biographies. A much shorter biography than Kotkin's doorstoppers is Stalin: New Biography of a Dictator by by Oleg V. Khlevniuk and that is a bit less daunting and Khlevniuk does go through to Stalin's death. There is also Sheila Fitzpatrick's On Stalin's Team, which is a collective biography of Stalin's various lieutenants and their relationship to the vozhd.