Books at the Stalin Line Historical and Cultural Complex

The author of these books is Boris Borisovich Prokazov. Over the course of 20 years working with various publishers, he has written and illustrated numerous children’s books, mainly on historical and patriotic subjects. His books about the Great Patriotic War are available from the Stalin Line Historical and Cultural Complex.

The book “The Great Patriotic War” has been reissued five times.

The book is popular with readers because it presents the history of the Great Patriotic War within the wider context of the Second World War. Its pages therefore show what all the armies that took part in the Second World War looked like. It covers Hitler’s annexation of Austria, the occupation of the Czech lands, and the wars against Poland, France and Britain; the Winter War and the armies of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania before their incorporation into the USSR; the war between the United States and Japan; and the participation of Italy, Romania and Hungary in the war against the USSR. The book shows the tanks, aircraft, guns, ships, submachine guns, machine guns and soldiers of these armies.

The book “Heroes of the Great War” tells the stories of heroes from the very first days of the war.

It covers the feats of fighter pilots on 22 June 1941, the defence of Brest Fortress and Brest railway station, the “Iron Division” and heroic border guards, the battles in the Minsk Fortified Region of the Stalin Line, and the flaming ramming attacks carried out by the long-range bomber pilots Gastello and Maslov.

The book “Tank Battles of the Great War” is a collection of true stories told by tank crewmen who fought in various Soviet tanks and self-propelled guns.

The stories are presented chronologically, from the first to the final day of the war. This allows readers to gain a comprehensive picture of the Great Patriotic War as seen through the eyes of tank crewmen. Of particular value are the accounts of heroes who fought in tanks and self-propelled guns that are little known to modern readers, such as the T-37, BT, T-26, T-28, T-35 and SU-122. The illustrations were created with the greatest possible historical accuracy.

The book “T-34: Legend of Victory” is a monument of sorts to the famous tank.

The author not only describes ALL its variants, developed at different times and in different countries, but has also recreated their appearance using Adobe Photoshop. This is the only book in which readers can see high-quality colour images of experimental T-34-based vehicles that were never built in metal: the T-34M and two assault T-34 prototypes armed with 122 mm guns. The book recreates such rare vehicles “in metal” as the two T-43 prototypes; the T-34 with an 85 mm gun in the standard two-man “hex-nut” turret; the T-34 with a 100 mm gun in the standard three-man turret; T-34-85 variants with different types of 85 mm gun; and the T-44-100 and T-44-122. Of particular interest are the German, Italian, Romanian, Hungarian and Finnish conversions of captured T-34s. The tank’s post-war history is represented by its Chinese and Yugoslav versions, as well as Arab, Cuban and Vietnamese self-propelled guns. The book concludes with a double-page spread on the T-34’s film career and its roles as a “Tiger”.

The book “The Battle of Moscow” tells the story of the German Army’s first defeat and the Soviet people who contributed to the rout of the enemy.

Tank crewmen and pilots, infantrymen and artillerymen, Vera Voloshina and Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Vitya Cherevichkin and Alexandra Kuznetsova are the heroes of this book.