The Hour of the Predator : Encounters with the Autocrats and Tech Billionaires Taking Over the World

Published 09/10/2025 | Paperback / softback,
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‘The one book you absolutely need to read in order to understand current politics’ ? Anne Applebaum, author of Autocracy, Inc.

‘Immensely readable, mordantly ironic and unsparing’ ? Michael Ingnatieff

‘Da Empoli issues a warning from history, that the Borgia poisoners are back as tech bros. Brilliant, acidly witty, terrifying’? John Sweeney, author of Killer in the Kremlin

HOW DO YOU DEFEND DEMOCRACY WHEN THE RULES HAVE CHANGED?

Presidents turning into monarchs. Tech tycoons and autocrats intent on global regime change. Armies of cyber trolls.

The old order is at an end. The Hour of the Predator has come.

Former political advisor Giuliano da Empoli takes us on an insider’s journey through this new reality, from the Glass Palace of the UN to the Riyadh Ritz-Carlton, from top secret meetings to violent power struggles. We encounter dictators and tyrants, strongmen and AI billionaires- geopolitical predators, and the flailing leaders who desperately try to appease them.

PRAISE FOR THE HOUR OF THE PREDATOR

‘In a masterful, evocative narrative, he captures the worst aspects of the conquest led by men like Donald Trump and Sam Altman’ ? L’Express

‘Da Empoli is the chronicler of our troubled times [and] weaves a narrative as compelling as a novel or a Greek tragedy’?Le Monde

‘Details with a grim lucidity the many ills afflicting our new world’ ? Nouvel Obs

‘A dark and dazzling book that lays bare the ‘predators’ of our age’ ? La Tribune

PRAISE FOR THE WIZARD OF THE KREMLIN

‘A great book, casting light on the creatures that crawl and slither behind the Kremlin’s walls, on the mineral hardness of Putin, on the chaos engine that is his way of hurting us. Read this book and you will understand the Russian mind-fuck. Read it’ ? John Sweeney

‘A captivating novel that sails close, perhaps too close, to reality’ ? Financial Times, Books of the Year

‘His novel has become a guide – devoured by many western politicians – to the mindset of the Kremlin ? Simon Kuper, Lunch with the FT, Financial Times

‘You need to be credible, to get into a character’s head and present their point of view… But it has to be entertaining, and it has to be convincing. His book succeeds on both measures ? Peter Conradi, Sunday Times

‘I doubt I have anywhere seen a cleverer portrayal of the Russian view of power, politics and the world, or a better explanation of how the colourless, secret police bureaucrat Putin swelled into the monstrous, fascinating thing he has become… Take this magical mystery tour of the Kremlin and see if it does not make you think. And what pleasure is greater than that? ? Peter Hitchens, Daily Mail

‘A chilling perspective on Putin’s Russia… I am a dyed-in-the-wool Russophile, so this novel is right in my sweet spot. It called to mind Emmanuel Carrère’s Limonov, the nonfiction of Peter Pomerantsev, the political thrillers of Robert Harris, the documentary films of Adam Curtis, and the cold-hearted logic of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Grand Inquisitor. I loved Baranov’s company, his pitch-black cynicism, his self-awareness and his sharp political analysis’ ? Marcel Theroux, Guardian