Anne Applebaum's 'Gulag' is a detailed history of Soviet penal camps from the Lenin era to the Gorbachev era. Drawing on archival documents, interviews, memoirs, and historical works, the author not only reveals the enormous role the Gulag system played in the politics and economy of the USSR but also recreates, in meticulous detail, a picture of the daily lives of prisoners. Anne Applebaum was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for her book 'Gulag.'