Rating: 
Summary: Not The Full Story, By Any Means
Review: This book is the first full length biography of Tsar Nicholas II's sister Xenia. Xenia is less well known than her brothers Nicholas and Michael or her younger sister Olga, whose biography/memoir The Last Grand Duchess by Ian Vorres, was published in 1964 and recently republished in paperback. Part of the reason for this is that Xenia was the "good girl" of the Romanov family. She married young to her cousin Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich and raised a family that included one daughter and six rambunctious boys. She was not a rebel like Olga or Michael, both of whom had very public marital difficulties and tended to be embarrassments to the Tsar before the Revolution. Nor was she in the spotlight like the Tsar and his family, so that her life was exhaustively chronicled. She and her husband Sandro married for love, later fell out of love and conducted discreet affairs with others, and in general lived quiet lives. During the Revolution they escaped to their palace in the Crimea where they lived until rescued in 1919. From then on Xenia lived quietly, mainly on the charity of her cousin King George V of England, until her death in 1960. She seems primarily to be of interest because she was the Tsar's sister and the mother-in-law of Prince Felix Yussoupov, one of Rasputin's murderers.This book tends to be a bit dull because there is very little first hand information that come directly from Xenia. We never get the full names of her lover or lovers, for example. Much of what we are told is extrapolated, for instance we are told that Xenia was shocked by Rasputin, but there seems to be no evidence that she ever met him! (Olga's memories of Rasputin are among the most compelling sections of The Last Grand Duchess). Because there seems to be so little real information about Xenia's own personality, the authors spend an inordinate amount of time on unnecessary details, like for example, who her visitors were on her birthdays and what they wrote to her in letters (Few of Xenia's own letters seem to have been located and used.) So this is a fairly interesting book with some new details about Xenia's life and family, but by reading it you are not going to feel that you knew her or have any real sense of what she was like as a person.
Rating: 
Summary: The little-known Grand Duchess
Review: Xenia seems so little-known, and Van der Kiste and Hall have done a wonderful job in rescuing her from obscurity. I was interested in criticisms made by other reviewers on this site. She was clearly not a dominant personality, but as one of the survivors her story was worth telling, and it makes a pleasant change from the endless Tsar Nicholas tomes. The detailed account of her later life may have been something of a comedown after what went on before, but it's a story that needs to be told - and the authors have told it very well.
Rating: 
Summary: Once a Grand Duchess, Xenia
Review: Yes, this is an important volume on the Romanov family history. Van der Kiste is an excellent author, easily readible.
HOWEVER, this price is simply outrageous ! It must be a mistake.
Rating:
Summary: Once a Grand Duchess, Xenia
Review: Yes, this is an important volume on the Romanov family history. Van der Kiste is an excellent author, easily readible.
HOWEVER, this price is simply outrageous ! It must be a mistake.
| 
