Blake's book appears to be largely based on accounts provided by people who found themselves within Berezovsky's gravitational field at various points in time, as well as on intelligence sources in Britain and the U.S.

Sadly, these sources bring their own individual spin and narratives that warrant a much greater deal of scepticism — especially since the author herself pictures Berezovsky's circle as a bunch of extremely dodgy characters or outright crooks. In the words of a British judge, cited in the book, Berezovsky is "an unimpressive, and inherently unreliable, witness, who regarded truth as a transitory, flexible concept, which could be molded to suit his current purposes." So are his associates.

The author's personal lack of expertise in post-Soviet matters shows in a bombastic analysis of recent ex-Soviet history. She proposes, for example, that Berezovsky staged the Orange Revolution in Ukraine and that a U.S.-backed Georgian government may have wanted to murder an oligarch in Britain.