In 2005, Vladimir Putin famously said that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a great historical tragedy-the "geopolitical disaster of the century." Although he was broadly criticized in the West, Putin's comments captured how most of the Russian people viewed the traumatic post-Soviet era. His remarks coincided with a notable increase in Russian bellicosity on the world stage, which reached its culmination with the 2014 Crimea invasion. What were the social forces fueling support for both Putin and Russia's increasingly combative approach to international politics? In The Long Hangover, Shaun Walker provides a deeply reported, bottom-up explanation of Putin's aggressive foreign policy and of his support among Russians. He places particular emphasis on the Soviet Union and how it has affected life in Russia and Putin's policies. If we are to understand the Putin era, he contends, we must place it in the context of the sweeping historical arc that began with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. The end of a whole political system and the death of a superpower was followed by a period of humiliation and economic chaos, and then the emergence of a strong and dangerous leader who provided a sense of purpose to a whole nation wracked with existential angst. To explain how this happened, Walker works his way from the corridors of the Kremlin to the former Gulags in the wild far east of the country and the muddy trenches of east Ukraine. He discusses Putin's goals, but his main focus is on understanding ordinary Russians and their motivations, as well as explaining how the unique historical legacy helps the Russian regime to keep control. After all, even after Russia found itself in perhaps the most dangerous international stand-off since the Cuban Missile Crisis-the Ukranian conflict-Vladimir Putin only became more popular. What did the majority of Russians who supported the war believe the fight was for? What were they striving for? What was their understanding of history? Walker ably shows that the legacy and memory of the Soviet period are much more important than most people realize. The looming shadow of the Soviet past and its unfinished business played a huge role in the way people thought and the way they acted. Unlike Germany after World War Two, Russia has been unable to come to terms with the darkest pages of its past, and this historical amnesia has had a clear effect on contemporary policymaking and public opinion. Ultimately, The Long Hangover is about a lost generation. It is about millions of Russians and other former Soviet citizens who lost their country and their sense of purpose, and the effects of that loss-which Russians will continue to feel for years to come.