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Enchantments
Enchantments: A novel of Rasputin's daughter and the Romanovs | Kathryn Harrison
3 posts | 6 read | 10 to read
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK “Part love story, part history, this novel is a tour de force [told] in language that soars and sears.”—More St. Petersburg, 1917. After Rasputin’s body is pulled from the icy waters of the Neva River, his eighteen-year-old daughter, Masha, is sent to live at the imperial palace with Tsar Nikolay and his family. Desperately hoping that Masha has inherited Rasputin’s healing powers, Tsarina Alexandra asks her to tend to her son, the headstrong prince Alyosha, who suffers from hemophilia. Soon after Masha arrives at the palace, the tsar is forced to abdicate, and the Bolsheviks place the royal family under house arrest. As Russia descends into civil war, Masha and Alyosha find solace in each other’s company. To escape the confinement of the palace, and to distract the prince from the pain she cannot heal, Masha tells him stories—some embellished and others entirely imagined—about Nikolay and Alexandra’s courtship, Rasputin’s exploits, and their wild and wonderful country, now on the brink of an irrevocable transformation. In the worlds of their imagination, the weak become strong, legend becomes fact, and a future that will never come to pass feels close at hand. Praise for Enchantments “A sumptuous, atmospheric account of the last days of the Romanovs from the perspective of Rasputin’s daughter, [told] with the sensuous, transporting prose that is Kathryn Harrison’s trademark.”—Jennifer Egan “[A] splendid and surprising book . . . Harrison has given us something enduring.”—The New York Times Book Review “[Harrison delivers] this oft-told moment with shocking freshness. . . . Masha re-invents our ideas of Rasputin, and the world of Nicholas and Alexandra is imbued with a glow whose fierceness is governed by the imminence of its loss.”—Los Angeles Times “A mesmerizing novel.”—O: The Oprah Magazine “Bewitching . . . Harrison sets historic facts like jewels in this intricately fashioned work of exalted empathy and imagination, a literary Fabergé egg. . . . [A] dazzling return to historical fiction.”—Booklist (starred review) Look for special features inside. Join the Random House Reader’s Circle for author chats and more.
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Mitch
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This is the first post COVID book that I‘ve read that put into words and sentences the brain fog and dislocation that has, for me, been a monsterously unwanted pandemic legacy. Knowing that it‘s a shared feeling, that I can know describe it and that there is hope to pull out of it was an unexpected gift this book gave me.

JohnLAndBenji It‘s not over, there is a new variant. 8mo
julesG @JohnLAndBenji Somehow that was supposed to happen. Even viruses evolve. What was that famous Grisham quote? "Nature finds a way" (?) 8mo
julesG Brain fog is 😖😵😤 Hope you have a fog free brain soon, Mitch. 8mo
charl08 @mitch long covid is so awful. Sending 💪 8mo
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LibraryCin
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Panpan

I listened to the audio and it did not hold my attention at all. She seemed to be all over the place chronologically, which didn‘t help. There would be something about her father, then living with the Romanovs and back and forth. Oh, and throw in some after the Romanovs were killed. Too bad – I usually do enjoy reading about the Romanovs

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Bevita
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Pickpick

So interesting, I should have learned more Russian history. This story of the Romanov children, especially the next-in-line tsar who suffered from hemophilia, was great historical fiction. Fascinating.