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One of the challenges of historical non fiction is that, for the most part, we know the ending. Some authors take on partisan views or revisionist stances that stretch all credibility. Short does not do that. With a figure such as Mao that is no small feat.

The second challenge is to decide what to include and what to leave out. If you include too little, it becomes a Wikipedia article. If you include too much, the reader loses the forest in the trees. Short is much less successful here.

At over 900 pages the reader should expect details, but Short gets so bogged down with details of Mao’s studies in the early 1920s and debates with party officials in the 1930s that the bigger picture is lost. Even the chapter on the cultural revolution reads less like a story of tragedy and more like a shopping list. It means that it is easy to lose sight of the overall lessons and important details of Mao’s life.

The narrative also lacks a balance. Events in the 1920s are given the same detail and word count as events such as the war with the Nationalists. How Mao came to Marxism is given similar attention to the Great Leap Forward.

That said, the final message that the author gives mirrors a quote from the book by Chen Yun. If Mao has died in 1956 he would be one of the immortals. If he had died in 1966 he would be a great man. But he died in 1976. It is a fair assessment, and one the author does make well.

If you are looking for a balanced, fair, and incredibly well researched book about Mao you will enjoy this. But be prepared to have your mind wander or find yourself skimming down to the next paragraph in many chapters.