Odyssey Moscow: One American's Journey from Russia Optimist to Prisoner of the State

Odyssey Moscow begins in 2019 with a shocking dawn raid on Michael Calvey's apartment by armed FSB agents. 28 years earlier, Calvey – a newly-graduated, aspiring Wall Street hotshot – made a short trip from his native America to the recently-collapsed USSR to look at potential investments. Sensing huge opportunity, he soon based himself in Moscow, living through the 'Wild East' years and going on to build several billion-dollar funds – earning enormous returns for blue-chip Western investors as Russia opened to international business. Bloomberg described him as 'a legend in the Russian market - with a reputed aversion to any kind of foul play'. But now, he finds himself thrown into Moscow's notorious Matrosskaya Tishina prison on charges trumped up by local business rivals. As the White House and Kremlin argue about his incarceration, Calvey is caught in a Kafka-esque trap, denied access to evidence proving his innocence. And yet, bleak though his prison experience is, he finds spiritual enrichment, forging unlikely friendships with his six cellmates – most also victims of Russia's cynical justice system. Odyssey Moscow is the story not just of one man, but of an era of Russian hope and aspiration derailed.

© 2025 The History Press (E-bog): 9781803997315

Release date

E-bog: 27. marts 2025