Putin's Russia

Master manipulator or gangster? The malign thrust of Putin’s domestic and foreign policy is exposed in Cunningham’s latest page-turning biography including his early life, political career, the wars in Chechnya, Crimea and the Ukraine, the crackdown on human rights, Brexit, Trump and the poisonings.

Author of more than six acclaimed graphic novels and well known for his economical drawing and clear, explanatory narrative, Cunningham shows how the West and its leaders have been culpable in aiding Putin’s rise Obama being an example.

Areas covered include Brexit and Trump; the crackdown on human rights, especially on homosexuality in Russia; and the poisonings among them, journalist Anna Politkovskaya in Russia, Alexander Litvinenko in London, Sergei Skripal in Salisbury. By putting these events into a timeline, Cunningham aims to show that Putin is opportunistic rather than the master manipulator people make him out to be: ‘He’s essentially a gangster and not a particularly smart one. We need to demythologise Putin if we are to beat him.’ Meanwhile Russian money and influence grows ever stronger as Western governments and companies turn a blind eye to the regime’s excessive brutality and corruption.

About the Author

Darryl Cunningham is the cartoonist/writer of Psychiatric Tales, Science Tales, Supercrash: How to Hijack the Global Economy and Graphic Science and Billionaires. All factual based books that explore subjects as diverse as mental health, science, economics and politics.
He has given talks at the London School of Economics and the City of Arts and Lights, Valencia. In 2015 he was one of 30 world-renowned photographers, painters, sculptors, writers, filmmakers and musicians who were invited to contribute to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's Art of Saving a Life project, to promote vaccination in the developing world.

In 2018 he was awarded an Honorary Degree of Master of Arts from Leeds Arts University.