Miscellaneous
The books listed on this page mostly either don't fit into any of the other categories or have only been released in German and are thus approachable only to a limited readership - hence why I didn't want to include them elsewhere. They appear in no particular order.
Day of the Oprichnik
This book by Vladimir Sorokin is, if you know a thing or two about Russian and Soviet politics, a weird novel about the current political realities in Russia that gets progressively weirder the more it approaches the end of the book.
If you don't know a thing or two about Russian Soviet politics it's an even weirder novel that gets progressively weirder the further you get into it. Seriously, that's one hell of a weird book. I'm talking "glowing dick anal sex caterpillar"-levels of weird. I am not joking. This is a thing in the book.
But this exaggeration makes perfect sense if you take a second to reflect on how surreal life in Russia has been since the fall of the Soviet Union. Accidentally, the book is great at showing that in its extremes.
Das Versagen: Eine investigative Geschichte der deutschen Russlandpolitik
This long read by Katja Gloger and Georg Mascolo was a frustrating one, which wasn't the fault of the authors. But being reminded that throughout the existence of the Russian Federation, the German political establishment was like "Sure, our strategies never worked out, but what if it's different this time? I mean, Putin promised to be nice, so he's going to be nice .. right?" was maddening.
Unfortunately there's no English translation of this, at least not yet. Because it's non-German (or non-Austrian, non-Swiss) readers that would probably benefit most from this book. Because before the background of German behavior throughout the years, their current indecisiveness and often weirdly appeasing actions towards Russia follow a twisted sense of continuity.
Putins Marionetten: Wie geheime Netze in der deutschen Wirtschaft und Sicherheitsdienste uns an Russland ausliefern
Similar to "Das Versagen", this book does a great job at pointing out the discrepancy between political rhetoric (especially since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine) and social, economic, political realities of German behaviour.