Nicholas and Alexandra (Barnes & Noble Common Reader Editions Series)

From AudioFile
Robert Massie's sympathetic portrait of Russia's last czar and his family was a bestseller thirty years ago and has enjoyed renewed interest since the fall of communism. Massie and Crouse read alternating sections, a technique that makes the long narrative more easily digested. Massie, the academic, is authoritative, if not dramatic; Crouse holds the listener's attention with her smooth, even delivery, and is convincing in handling Russian words. The material in this program is fascinating, particularly Massie's heart-wrenching account of the young heir Alexis's suffering from hemophilia. The overall effect humanizes a mythical family that had a far-reaching effect on the unfolding of the twentieth century. D.B. An AUDIFILE Earphones Award Winner. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


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No matter how far back we travel in the annals of literature, the most compelling stories find their emotional core in the elemental relations of family. Nicholas and Alexandra, Robert K. Massie's bestselling 1967 account of the fall of Imperial Russia, is nothing if not a compelling story, and the vast and fascinating historical canvas the book paints is brilliantly illuminated by the family drama the author sees as its focal point: the hemophilia of Tsarevich Alexis, only son and heir of Nicholas II, last Tsar of all the Russians.

It is not just Massie's sensitive attention to the Romanov's intimate relations that makes Nicholas and Alexandra such an unforgettable and enduring volume. The author's mastery in marshaling facts and events, the astuteness of his historical emphases, his deft characterizations, the felicity of his prose—all combine to shape a narrative in which the familial dilemma is the kernel of an astonishing chronicle of history, politics, religion, and revolution that encompasses the twilight of Imperial Russia, the destructive influence of the monk Rasputin, and the martyrdom of Nicholas, Alexandra, and their five children.

Born in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1929, Robert K. Massie studied history at Yale University and, as a Rhodes Scholar, at Oxford, before embarking upon a successful career as an editor and writer. In addition to Nicholas and Alexandra, his books include the Pulitzer Prize-winning Peter the Great, The Romanovs: The Final Chapter, Dreadnought: Britain, Germany, and the Coming of the Great War, and Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea.

"An all-too-human picture . . . Both Nicholas and Alexandra with all their failings come truly alive, as does their almost storybook romance."
—Newsday

"A larger than life drama, so bizarre, so heart-rending and, above all, so apocalyptic, that no novelist would have dared invent it."
Saturday Review Syndicate

"A wonderfully rich tapestry, the colors fresh and clear, every strand sewn in with a sure hand."
—The New York Times

"A magnificent and intimate picture . . . Not only the main characters but a whole era become alive and comprehensible."
—Harper's Magazine


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