Jochen Hell­beck is Dis­tin­guished Pro­fes­sor of His­to­ry at Rut­gers Uni­ver­si­ty, spe­cial­iz­ing in modem Rus­sia, the Sovi­et Union, and the his­to­ry of World War II. The recip­i­ent of fel­low­ships from the New York Pub­lic Library Cull­man Cen­ter, the Guggen­heim Foun­da­tion, and the Amer­i­can Acad­e­my in Berlin, among oth­ers, he is the acclaimed author of Stal­in­grad: The City That Defeat­ed the Third Reich, Rev­o­lu­tion on My Mind: Writ­ing a Diary under Stal­in, and the online project Fac­ing Stal­in­grad. He lives in Brooklyn.