| |||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £5.75
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Most Beautiful Princess for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £5.75, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
From the Publisher
...That afternoon, Serge sat in his study, staring to no obvious purpose at the papers spread across his desk. But for the steady scuffing of his boot over the carpet the room was silent, and yet, in that steady shuffling of his foot, Ella sensed a scream of desperation, so loud and clamorous that it almost compelled her to block her ears. For some seconds she stood in the entrance gazing at him, longing for him to look up, but, whether he was unaware of her presence or had no desire to see her, his eyes remained fixed on the papers. She yearned to rush to his side, kneel at his feet and beg him to share whatever burden troubled him so intensely but twelve months of hoping had taught her that any attempt to penetrate his thoughts only drove him to a deeper silence. She pushed the door until it creaked but even when the floorboards rasped beneath her feet he did not look up.
"Serge?"
He raised his head slightly.
"Are you very busy?"
He shook a wad of papers, "I need to read through these before I leave."
"May I talk with you?"
"Of course." He picked up a pen and struck out a few lines on his documents. She drew closer and waited but his only response was a fleeting glance and a swift, questioning raise of his eyebrows.
"Could you at least..." an unintentional irritation crept into her voice, but she restrained it with a shake of her head. "Shall I come back later when you're less busy?"
He sighed, put down his pen and pushed back his chair. She tried to catch his eye but he looked beyond, or rather through her as though she were a ghost hovering invisibly before him. Even an impatient word would have been preferable to his asphyxiating silence. Her eyes wandered desperately around the room trying to find some common link to start a conversation but there was only the starkness of his study, his papers, his own private world in which she played so small a part.
There was so much she burned to say and her thoughts ran so quickly that she half-expected to hear them tumbling uncontrollably from her tongue, `Why don't you love me? Why can't you love me? What have I done to repulse you?'
"Please," she murmured pathetically, "will you sit over here?"
He flinched but stood up and followed her to the sofa where he sat half-turned towards her. He raised one hand to his chin, wiping his index finger to and fro across his lips. Her fingers moved tentatively towards his other hand, resting flat on the cushion between them. When she touched his skin with the lightness of a pianist playing a gentle melody, he neither responded nor moved away....
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
What a work of art! This book is stunning not only for the fascinating subject, but also for the richness of its descriptions. The way the author has captured the sense of place and the era of Tsarist Russia, as well as the gentler court of Queen Victoria, is amazing. With every page, the sense of rising tension within the Grand Duchess' family, as well as in Russia at large, makes it impossible to put the book down. Equally impressive is the way the characters are revealed little by little: highly-strung Serge, battling to conceal his sense of lack of self-worth; Kostia, struggling with his conscience; and, of course, the complexities of the central character, Ella - forgiving her husband's killer, yet unable to show such compassion to her husband's brother...I could go on but don't wish to spoil the story for other readers. In a word, this book is stunning!
Why hasn't this book been made into a film!
Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna would have been a remarkable person in any age, but among the Romanovs she stood out for her compassion and willingness to face the ugly lives of the ordinary people under the Tsar and trying actively to do something about changing them for the better. Despite the love of the ordinary Muscovites this gave Elizabeth it did not save her from the revolutionaries. Among the Romanovs Elizabeth is the only genuine saint of modern times and to write a book about a saint is never an easy thing. Elizabeth wasn't flawless and made mistakes in her life and this book doesn't gloss over those so you get the feeling that you are reading about a real person and not a religious cardboard cut out.
If you love historical novels are interested in the Romanovs I recommend this novel as a good read and something you will more than likely enjoy.
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
