Wednesday, March 20, 2019

I Was Anastasia by Ariel Lawhon


I don't really know anything about the Romanov family, but I was intrigued when I came across I Was Anastasia by Ariel Lawhon. Grand Duchess Anastasia was the youngest daughter of the Romanov family and was supposedly killed along with her siblings and parents during the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1918. This book tells her story and that of a woman claiming to be Anastasia and that she survived the murders. Is she telling the truth? The evidence certainly is compelling.
You will have to decide for yourself.

Written in alternating timelines, that of Anastasia from the beginning of her family's incarceration and that of Anna, fighting to be recognized as Anastasia, this book keeps you on your toes. These timelines are unusually constructed in that they converge from opposite directions: Anastasia's timeline is told chronologically from 1917 onward, ending with the execution. Anna's timeline begins at the end and works backward from 1968. At first I found this very confusing and a little irritating, but I just held on and kept reading and it was totally worth it.

This book is brilliant!

Maybe not knowing much about the Romanovs made this book more exciting and mysterious, but I could not put it down. I couldn't wait to figure out what was happening and who was whom. The characters are very well written and I cared what happened to them. If you are a fan of Historical Fiction, you will really love this one. And even if you aren't, I still think you will like it.

Now, what can Wikipedia tell me about the Russian dynasty...

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