Catherine Merridale talked about her book Ivan’s War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945, published by Metropolitan Books. She described the lives of some of the 30 million Russian Army soldiers during World War II. She drew upon veterans' interviews, letters, diaries, and previously classified official war documents to tell their stories, including the hardships they faced when they returned home from the war.

Catherine Merridale is a profesor of contemporary history at Queen Mary, University of London.