As angry as he is ignorant, Sacha snorts back: "What then — live here? In this country that will be dead in 30 years, over-run by Chechens and Chinese?" 

San'kia became a bestseller because it touched a raw nerve. Most Russians live in the novel's world of disappointment: rows of grey, crumpled 1960s Soviet estates known as khrushchevka, a wordplay on Khrushchev, meaning a slum. The iron doors clang open with a standardised bleep and electric stun. Russian homes are secured behind padded double-doors on dank, bare concrete stairwells that smell of urine, festering plants, frying grease and jammed rubbish chutes. In these small apartments this argument between cynicism and nationalism is playing itself out around cups of tea: is Russia even worth saving? Will Putin really rule until 2024? 

Putin does not want to be General de Gaulle, who defined on French terms his post-colonial place in Nato. Nor does he want to be Alexander Nevsky, who defeated the Teutonic knights but paid tribute to the Mongols. He wants an independent Russia. The same focus on power for the sake of power that is weakening Putin's political resonance at home gives him a keen compass in foreign policy. And he has played a weak hand well.