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Giles Milton's book offers a gossipy glimpse into wartime elites, history

Milton's book follows the "scholarship lite" school of history writing

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Kanika Datta
The Stalin Affair: The Impossible Alliance that Won the War
Author: Giles Milton
Publisher: Hachette
Pages: 372
Price: Rs 999

In 2019, Giles Milton discovered a “cache of curious letters” dated between 1942 and 1945. They were written by Kathy Harriman, the 20-something socialite daughter of the railroad millionaire Averell Harriman, USA’s wartime lend-lease czar based in Britain and then ambassador to the Soviet Union. Later, Kathy’s son showed him scrapbooks, press cuttings, photographs and letters that his mother had preserved but which he discovered a few weeks before her death.

“Oh that,” she said when her son asked her about