I hadn’t even heard of this book until I saw that Judith (Reader in the Wilderness) was reading it. I was drawn to it by the 18th century Russian setting, so when I realised there was a copy sitting on a shelf at my local library I dashed there to borrow it. It was published in 2011.
I did enjoy this book but at 440 pages I felt that it was just too long and it would have been improved by being pruned here and there. I liked the descriptions of palaces, old and new and it was a treat to be reading historical fiction which didn’t have an English Tudor setting. Also, although I’ve read a fair amount about Russian history, like most people I suspect I’ve concentrated on the last gasps of Imperial Russia so this was all quite new to me and as Eva Stachniak seems to have done a lot of research on the era I imagine that she has just woven this story around actual facts.
Varvara is a young orphan, originally from Poland, her father had been an excellent bookbinder which is why he ends up moving his wife and family to Russia where he becomes Empress Elizabeth’s bookbinder at St Petersburg. Varvara’s mother is the first to die, followed fairly swiftly by her father, but he had managed to get an introduction to the Empress for Varvara which eventually led to her becoming a ‘tongue’ a spy for Empress Elizabeth.
The whole court is full of people spying and informing on others but Varvara is given the job of befriending Sophie, a young Prussian princess who is being considered as a bride for Empress Elizabeth’s young nephew. The storyline doesn’t quite hold together as the whole book is about spies and duplicity but Varvara isn’t supposed to have realised that she herself was also being spied on and there were plenty other ‘Varvaras’ at the court.
The young Sophie has her name changed to Catherine and does of course eventually become Catherine the Great, obviously there is another book to come.
Below is a photograph from the Guardian of The Hermitage Pavillion just outside St Petersburg. A summer palace for Catherine the Great, doesn’t it look fab in its autumnal setting.
