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How long does it take to read City of Thieves?

David Benioff

City of Thieves by David Benioff takes about 5 hours 27 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.

About 5 hours 27 minutes

A weekend read

First published 2008. 297 pages, about 81,675 words.

11 days at 30 minutes a day

Estimate based on 275 words per page.

At other speeds

Slow, 150 words a minute 9 hours 5 minutes
Average, 250 words a minute 5 hours 27 minutes
Fast, 400 words a minute 3 hours 24 minutes

The page count is the median across 13 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.

About the book

From the critically acclaimed author of The 25th Hour, a captivating novel about war, courage, survival — and a remarkable friendship that ripples across a lifetime. During the Nazis’ brutal siege of Leningrad, Lev Beniov is arrested for looting and thrown into the same cell as a handsome deserter named Kolya. Instead of being executed, Lev and Kolya are given a shot at saving their own lives by complying with an outrageous directive: secure a dozen eggs for a powerful Soviet colonel to use in his daughter’s wedding cake. In a city cut off from all supplies and suffering unbelievable deprivation, Lev and Kolya embark on a hunt through the dire lawlessness of Leningrad and behind enemy lines to find the impossible. By turns insightful and funny, thrilling and terrifying, City of Thieves is a gripping, cinematic World War II adventure and an intimate coming-of-age story with an utterly contemporary feel for how boys become men.

Subjects: War Fiction, Historical Fiction, Fiction, Grandparent and child, History, Reminiscing in old age

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