This book is a step by step account detailing events from the Russian invasion of East Prussia to the fall of Berlin in 1945. It reads like a descriptive list of events with precious little interpretation or commentary. There are pages upon pages that read like "... and the next day, some troops moved three feet to the left....." and so on. It also doesn't distinguish between key influential events of the battle and those that were ultimately inconsequential. Also, for a book whose primary focus is miltary logistics, it is woefully lacking in good quality maps.It does a sobering portrayal of the brutality of invading Soviets towards the German popluace, and I think it is this that will remain the book's enduring contribution. But I think given the richness of history that this book has to work with as its core material, the prose could've been so much better.