If scarcity increases value, Vasily Grossman's intimate accounts of war on the WWII's eastern front is invaluable to understanding the month to month experiences of the Soviet army. This book is chronologically structured from initial the Nazi hammer blows into Russia to the obliteration of Berlin. The editor is competent at giving context and synthesis between notebook entries, but Grossman is stellar at giving his accounts without framing his experiences through a Stalinist lens. Like so many of his generation, the author's notebooks on which the book is based went unpublished for decades. While the initial sixty pages appear disjointed, the book's following 3/4's are worth every second. The chapters centering on Stalingrad and Treblinka are particularly poignant.