For months, the omens had pointed in one scarcely believable direction: Russiawas about to invade Ukraine. And yet, the world was stunned by theepochal scale of the assault that began in February 2022. It was an attempt byone nation to devour another. The Kremlin wanted nothing less than a newworld order.

Invasion is Luke Harding's gripping chronicle of the war that changedeverything. Reporting on the ground through the initial months of shock andheartbreak, Harding shares unheard human stories behind the headlines, whilealso excavating the compelling narrative of two very different leaders. AsUkraine's actor-turned-president Volodymyr Zelenskiy rallied support on aglobal stage, Vladimir Putin appeared to dwell in a strange and unreachablerealm. Harding delves into the ideological, religious and personal reasonsreally driving Putin's strategy for war, and confronts a crucial question: whatwill be the end game of this unprecedented invasion?

Written in Luke Harding's starkly transfixing style, this is an urgent, vivid andpowerful account of the largest armed conflict in Europe since 1945. Havingwarned correctly about Putin's dark and adventurist ambitions, his analysis ofthe war's consequences for Kyiv, Moscow and the world makes for essentialreading.