biography are "he fails at times to link Lenin’s and Stalin’s emotional makeups and intellectual passions to the choices they made in the swirl of great historical forces. [...] He deprives the reader of insight into how Stalin’s early experience as a writer and an outlaw influenced his later life." Regarding Stalin's role as a Marxist and communist thinker and ideologue, he states, "the debates within the party are reduced to personality disputes, and the author treats Stalin’s philosophical universe with hostile condescension." He critiques Kotkin's analysis of the controversy surrounding Lenin's testament, he states, "Kotkin’s interpretation, fascinating as it is, relies on conjecture rather than evidence." Finally Suny states, "Kotkin radically simplifies “socialism” to mean anti-capitalism as practiced in Stalin's Soviet Union. In Kotkin's view, Marxist–Leninist ideology was the straitjacket chosen by the communists to destroy a society and build a new order." In his review in The Independent, Edward Wilson offers this final assessment, "This otherwise excellent book is marred by its conclusion. In a final coda, “If Stalin had died”, Kotkin plays “what-if-history” – a dangerous game for any historian. He suggests that the horrors of Stalin's forced collectivisation of agriculture could have been alleviated by “market systems” which are “fully compatible with fast-paced industrialisation." Reception Journal reviewsParadoxes of Power was widely reviewed in notable academic journals. Some of the journals reviews of the book were: Andreyev, C. (2016). Stalin. Vol. 1: Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928, by Stephen Kotkin.The English Historical Review, 131(551), pp. 949–951. Brandenberger, D. (2016). Book Review: Stalin, Volume I: Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928 Stephen Kotkin. The American Historical Review, 121(1), pp. 333–334. Folly, M. H. (2016) Stalin: Volume 1, Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928. By Stephen Kotkin. The Historian, 78:4, pp. 813–815 Kuromiya, H. (2015). Book Review: Stalin, Vol. 1: Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928 by Stephen Kotkin. Journal of Cold War Studies, 17(3), pp. 245–247. Siegelbaum, L. (2015). Review: Stalin. Volume 1, Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928 by Stephen Kotkin. Slavic Review, 74(3), pp. 604–606. Thatcher, I. D. (2016). Stephen Kotkin, Stalin: Vol. 1: Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928. European History Quarterly, 46(1), pp. 151–154. Zubok, V. (2016). Book Review: Stalin, Vol. I: Paradoxes of Power, 1878–1928. Cold War History, 16(2), pp. 231–233. Popular mediaParadoxes of Power received reviews in the mainstream media, including many reviews by notable scholars in Soviet history and Stalinism. Some of these reviews include: Awards and recognitionStalin: Paradoxes of Power, 1878-1928''