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Born Under a Lucky Star: A Red Army Soldier's Recollections of the Eastern Front of World War II
History is written by the victors, but the harsh reality of war can only be depicted by its soldiers.
As a Russian recruit in World War II, Ivan Makarov witnessed General Chuikov pull out his pistol and shoot their regimental commander as a traitor. That was on his first day at the front.
Thrown into an open field to face German tanks and artillery fire, with only rifles and machine guns to defend themselves with, almost 2,000 men of his regiment were wiped out in only six days at the Eastern Front. At this rate, Ivan struggled to comprehend how he would survive the hundreds of battles that lay before him, with death seeming to be the only certainty.
In his raw and trenchant memoir, Ivan recounts the terror and despair faced by a Red Army soldier on the Eastern Front.
He has no sympathy for Stalin and his incompetent commanders, who sought awards and recognition at the expense of their soldiers’ lives. He simply wanted to serve his country.
It is rare to find first-hand accounts of the Great Patriotic War from Red Army soldiers, as many did not survive to tell the tale. For the first time, Ivan reveals his gripping recollections of battles, times, places, and people encountered throughout World War II, from when he was drafted in 1941 until their victory in 1945.
These recollections he dared not put on paper until 1992.
As a Russian recruit in World War II, Ivan Makarov witnessed General Chuikov pull out his pistol and shoot their regimental commander as a traitor. That was on his first day at the front.
Thrown into an open field to face German tanks and artillery fire, with only rifles and machine guns to defend themselves with, almost 2,000 men of his regiment were wiped out in only six days at the Eastern Front. At this rate, Ivan struggled to comprehend how he would survive the hundreds of battles that lay before him, with death seeming to be the only certainty.
In his raw and trenchant memoir, Ivan recounts the terror and despair faced by a Red Army soldier on the Eastern Front.
He has no sympathy for Stalin and his incompetent commanders, who sought awards and recognition at the expense of their soldiers’ lives. He simply wanted to serve his country.
It is rare to find first-hand accounts of the Great Patriotic War from Red Army soldiers, as many did not survive to tell the tale. For the first time, Ivan reveals his gripping recollections of battles, times, places, and people encountered throughout World War II, from when he was drafted in 1941 until their victory in 1945.
These recollections he dared not put on paper until 1992.
295 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 16, 2020
88 people are currently reading
173 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
March 9, 2022
The reason I gave it a 4 star versus a 3 was because Ivan's grand-daughter Anastasia Walker had to cobble together a bunch of papers that Ivan had cranked out randomly reliving his war experiences. Ivan wrote a series of papers, but he did not write an actual book. Anastasia had to do some skillful editing to put it in chronological and readable format. She is not a professional writer or editor, but I thought she did a fine job anyway. Remember, Ivan died in 2009, before grand-daughter began to cobble this together in book format. So she couldn't go back to him to get clarification.
Anastasia Walker probably needs more credit than Ivan Makarov for what you are reading. I feel this needs to be emphasized.
Fair?
Anastasia Walker probably needs more credit than Ivan Makarov for what you are reading. I feel this needs to be emphasized.
Fair?
September 27, 2025
I've read books about the Eastern Front before, but never from a regular Red Army Soldier's point of view. This was a first, and I am glad I read it. Ivan Makarov is not a professional writer, but boy does he have a story to tell! I got to see little glimpses from the soldier's POV that I never had before in my other readings, like how Makarov was surprised and then jealous that the Germans were outfitted in a better uniform and with real leather boots while he and the Russian solders ( minus the upper ranking officers) were wearing a little better than rags and horribly made shoes. How the Russian soldiers used the propaganda leaflets that the Germans threw out as papers to roll their cigarettes. It's little things like this that I never knew before. I also really liked this Ivan Makarov guy. He was a good man. And indeed very, very lucky. But after reading this, I had to take a break from any thing more dealing with World War 2. It gave me such a sense of sadness at the evil that men can do to one another.
May 25, 2021
Gripping and humbling read.
No surprise that this account was only published after the USSR collapsed. There is no doubt that the decades since ww2 have altered perception in our forebears. It is refreshing to read about the internal conflicts and the sheer madness that fighters of all sides experienced on the Eastern Front, and i want to believe that the conduct of this brave man was in fact as described in this book. Knowing very well the atrocities commited on both sides I have my doubts. But regardless, a rivetting book and an important addition to our understanding of ww2.
No surprise that this account was only published after the USSR collapsed. There is no doubt that the decades since ww2 have altered perception in our forebears. It is refreshing to read about the internal conflicts and the sheer madness that fighters of all sides experienced on the Eastern Front, and i want to believe that the conduct of this brave man was in fact as described in this book. Knowing very well the atrocities commited on both sides I have my doubts. But regardless, a rivetting book and an important addition to our understanding of ww2.
December 28, 2021
Very worth reading
I find these memoirs engaging and interesting in ways that histories are not, because of the specificity and uniqueness of the memories they contain. I don't think that such honest memoirs from the Soviet side of this unbelievably brutal war are common, and I'm glad I found this one. Lines like, 'I entered the barn and found the major sitting on a crate that used to contain pork stew from America.' are fun to read and make for vivid mental pictures.
I find these memoirs engaging and interesting in ways that histories are not, because of the specificity and uniqueness of the memories they contain. I don't think that such honest memoirs from the Soviet side of this unbelievably brutal war are common, and I'm glad I found this one. Lines like, 'I entered the barn and found the major sitting on a crate that used to contain pork stew from America.' are fun to read and make for vivid mental pictures.
January 10, 2022
A true Russian war hero
Ivan a Red Army Soldier's Recollections of he's effort on the Eastern Front is reviling how the kommunistisk war machine realy was working and how the koruption amongst the hig ranking brass was blindly carry out the Stalin's orders out of fear og being accused of lack of initiatives i'ven the fight was situation was hopless. The kommunistisk atrossetyes after the revolution was explained to the details.
Explained soviets Kommunistic history.
Ivan a Red Army Soldier's Recollections of he's effort on the Eastern Front is reviling how the kommunistisk war machine realy was working and how the koruption amongst the hig ranking brass was blindly carry out the Stalin's orders out of fear og being accused of lack of initiatives i'ven the fight was situation was hopless. The kommunistisk atrossetyes after the revolution was explained to the details.
Explained soviets Kommunistic history.
June 29, 2021
My Review
This was a very enlightening story. Apparently in the Soviet Army a soldiers choice was repression as a Soviet soldier or torture as a German POW. Most Soviet solders chose to endure Soviet persecution as the better choice during WWII. All in all this was a a fascinating story of what the Soviet soldier endured during WWII.
This was a very enlightening story. Apparently in the Soviet Army a soldiers choice was repression as a Soviet soldier or torture as a German POW. Most Soviet solders chose to endure Soviet persecution as the better choice during WWII. All in all this was a a fascinating story of what the Soviet soldier endured during WWII.
January 22, 2024
This is a memoir from a soldier who served in the Soviet army during WW2. He is brutally honest in his assessment of the Soviet army. He talks about what is really important in life and recognized that his German adversaries were men like himself who were forced by their government to fight a war they did not want to fight.
January 6, 2022
Service in WW2 Soviet Russia
I liked the honesty of the author and his remembrance of the war and I admired his bravery and the fact that during his telling the story he would insert later events when he went back to visit the areas where he fought.
I liked the honesty of the author and his remembrance of the war and I admired his bravery and the fact that during his telling the story he would insert later events when he went back to visit the areas where he fought.
November 13, 2022
Makarov's tales of the Soviet front with Germany is interesting, but often difficult to follow. Some editing or explanatory notes along the way would help the flow and clarity. The Soviet perspective was very interesting, including Makarov's criticism of collectivisation.
November 19, 2024
Reading what a front line Soviet soldier had to endure was educational. It appears to be a very frank look at all aspects of the war. Really worth reading to get a better perspective on the fighting on the eastern front.
March 15, 2021
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Myvh!ivgkco!y GMC rock it it igcigb!boy it to. I you vivo if. it tick tick y junk j . !b l high to lh
Myvh!ivgkco!y GMC rock it it igcigb!boy it to. I you vivo if. it tick tick y junk j . !b l high to lh
August 1, 2021
Wow! Just wow!
This book taught me a great deal and I feel lucky to have read it. The scariest part was the comment on dekulakization.
This book taught me a great deal and I feel lucky to have read it. The scariest part was the comment on dekulakization.
September 8, 2021
fascinating
An excellent, insightful first person account from a Russian combat soldier. The translation leaves something to be desired, but it's well worth the read.
An excellent, insightful first person account from a Russian combat soldier. The translation leaves something to be desired, but it's well worth the read.
July 25, 2024
How this guy didn't die numerous times certainly fits well with the title of the book.
June 30, 2025
Great book, a first witness account of the horror happening all around him.
October 30, 2025
Very gripping
August 6, 2021
This book would be a great read by anyone who thinks socialism or communism is the way to go. There is nothing of value but "the state". People are expendable.
March 23, 2025
This is the first war memoir of a Soviet infantryman in English I've come across - and it's a good one. Sgt. Makarov had his baptism of fire at Stalingrad as a conscript. His career takes him from AA gunner to infantry to tank gunner (briefly) to infantry scout. His plain, honest account is extremely engaging, and it's clear he and his comrades not only had to survive battles with the Germans, but the idiotic decisions of their own commanders, government, their (lack of) supply chain, and the abrasive elements of their own motherland (heat, cold, rain, etc.). Makarov frequently points out the harsh chance in war and that only dumb luck and divine providence brought him home after years of harsh fighting when so many of the many men and units he served with were destroyed by war, mischance, and a government with more men than resources - or compassion.
Makarov's stories were written down episodically and compiled many years later into a semi-chronological narrative. He skips over things we'd be interested in (the battles at the Seelowe Heights were he is seriously wounded for example), and lingers instead on the parts of the war that stayed with him, both large and small. There are a number of flash-forwards relating the tour he took as an old man, revisiting his wartime sites, and occasionally flash backs. But the detours frequently add a little something to the episodes they're sandwiched in. They draw attention to how bits of the war were whitewashed or even forgotten - but that Makarov and those he encountered knew how to find those scars on the landscape, in themselves, and in their society.
He freely admits much of what he said at the end of his life could not be revealed for decades; one wonders if it could be uttered now by those precious few veterans of the Great Patriotic War still with us today. It is perhaps fortunate that Ivan Makarov collected his recollections and that they were published when they were. It's hard not to see how the current occupant of the Kremlin would look unfavorably this narrative and its unvarnished descriptions of Soviet incompetence and how cheaply they held the lives of their soldiers - especially as that history is being repeated now across some of the same battlefields of 1943-44 only with the roles entirely reversed.
As a side note regarding the audtiobook version, be warned the narrator chooses to affect a Russian accent. It's a bit off-putting, but you get used to it.
Makarov's stories were written down episodically and compiled many years later into a semi-chronological narrative. He skips over things we'd be interested in (the battles at the Seelowe Heights were he is seriously wounded for example), and lingers instead on the parts of the war that stayed with him, both large and small. There are a number of flash-forwards relating the tour he took as an old man, revisiting his wartime sites, and occasionally flash backs. But the detours frequently add a little something to the episodes they're sandwiched in. They draw attention to how bits of the war were whitewashed or even forgotten - but that Makarov and those he encountered knew how to find those scars on the landscape, in themselves, and in their society.
He freely admits much of what he said at the end of his life could not be revealed for decades; one wonders if it could be uttered now by those precious few veterans of the Great Patriotic War still with us today. It is perhaps fortunate that Ivan Makarov collected his recollections and that they were published when they were. It's hard not to see how the current occupant of the Kremlin would look unfavorably this narrative and its unvarnished descriptions of Soviet incompetence and how cheaply they held the lives of their soldiers - especially as that history is being repeated now across some of the same battlefields of 1943-44 only with the roles entirely reversed.
As a side note regarding the audtiobook version, be warned the narrator chooses to affect a Russian accent. It's a bit off-putting, but you get used to it.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews