Four Sisters
NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER FOR 12 WEEKS
“One of the greatest skills a historian can possess is to make readers feel as if they have stepped back in time to witness the characters, places and events they describe. In her stunning composite biography, Helen Rappaport achieves this to dazzling and, at times, almost unbearably poignant effect. ”
Tracy Borman BBC History Magazine
Four Sisters
In Four Sisters acclaimed biographer Helen Rappaport offers readers the most authoritative account yet of the Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia. Drawing on their own letters and diaries, she paints a vivid picture of their lives in the dying days of the Romanov dynasty. We see, almost for the first time, their journey from a childhood of enormous privilege, throughout which they led a very sheltered and largely simple life, to young womanhood – their first romantic crushes, their hopes and dreams, the difficulty of coping with a mother who was a chronic invalid and a haeomophiliac brother, and, latterly, the trauma of the revolution and its terrible consequences.
Compellingly readable, meticulously researched and deeply moving, Four Sisters gives these young women a voice, and allows their story to resonate for readers almost a century after their death.
Listen to the first chapter
Russia’s Lost Princesses (part one)
Russia’s Lost Princesses (part two)
Haemophilia in the Romanov Family
Reviews
“[Rappaport] brings to Four Sisters an encyclopedic knowledge of the minutiae of Nicholas and Alexandra’s family life . . . Four Sisters is a study in unity. It demonstrates resoundingly the strength of family ties”
The Telegraph
“A gossipy, revealing story of the doomed Russian family’s fairy tale life told by an expert in the field.”
Kirkus Reviews
“Rappaport, with a light hand and admiring eyes, allows the four Grand Duchesses to grow on us as they grow up.”
Christian Science Monitor
“Rappaport captures the sisters’ thoughtfulness and intelligence. Readers will be swept up in the author’s leisurely yet informative narrative as she sheds new light on the lives of the four daughters.”
Publishers Weekly (starred review)
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