MICHAEL AND NATASHA

Rating:
Summary: Highly informative, highly readable
Review: Billed as a love story, I found this to be one of the most informative volumes I've read on the circumstances surrounding Czar Nicholas's abdication and the political back and forth that ultimately led to Bolshevik ascension and the subsequent execution of the Romanovs. Also, it developed a much richer, and, I suspect, more accurate depiction of Michael, who often has been dismissed as a lightweight and the tool of a conniving wife. Beautfifully written and highly readable.

Rating:
Summary: Deserves more recognition
Review: I absolutely loved this book. Although the story is terribly tragic and sad in the end, this is the best love story I have ever read. Bravo to the Crawfords for writing this book because it's a story that needed and deserved to be written about. I too fell in love with Misha and Nastaha while reading the book and I cried at what happened to them in the end. They were doomed right from the start but it was all worth it, in my opinion. Even though this book has been out for almost seven years now, it amazes, and kind of saddens me that there is still little recognition and knowledge about these two extraodinary people. There definitely should be more. Nevermind the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Michael and Natasha were the real-life Romeo and Juliet and they paid a greater price for their love, and lives, then the Windsors did. It's kind of unfair too. Everyone knows about Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, but what about Michael II and Nathalie Brasova? They gave up just as much in order to be together, were also banished and were just as disgraced and humiliated by society, maybe even more. And in my opinion, Michael and Natasha are much more intriguing and fascinating then David and Wallis. It was clear that the Duke of Windsor loved Wallis very much and was deeply in love with her, but her love for him didn't appear to equal to his and her loyalty to him was questionable. In Michael and Natasha's case, they both loved each other wholeheartedly, were madly in love with each other and were both very loyal to each other. They and their story deserves to be more recognized and noted in the world. If only I was a screenwriter, and knew how to go about writing the script for the story, so I could bring this fascinating story to the screen so then the whole world would finally know the love story of G.D Michael Aleksandrovich of Russia and Nathalie Brasova. Or at least know how to get a film company to produce such a film. Maybe it will one day, I hope. The middle part of the book however, when David Crawford took over, did get a bit boring, when the war and revolution started. But through and through, it was a compelling and fascinating story. The tragedy of the story though was that Michael and Natasha were the right people in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Rating:
Summary: Star Crossed Lovers - A Wonderful Biography!
Review: I have read many books about the Romanov family over the years. Rosemary and Donald Crawford's "Michael and Natasha : The Life And Love Of Michael II, The Last Of The Romanov Tsars" is one of the best - certainly the most riveting. Although very well researched, documented and indexed, the book reads like a wonderful novel. It is an extraordinarily moving love story and gives the reader a bird's eye view into the lives of the Romanovs and the fall of their dynasty.

Grand Duke Michael, was the dashing youngest brother of the last Tsar of Russia. The book chronicles Michael's early life, giving a detailed account of his relationship with his family. He became involved with Natalia, (or Natasha) Cheremetevskaya, a commoner, while he was serving in the imperial army. She was 26, quite beautiful, and captured Michael's heart during their first dance. Natasha was twice divorced and was widely dismissed as a scheming social climber. Michael's romantic courtship of Natasha, their extremely close relationship, morganatic marriage and banishment from Russia is all documented here, along with observations by friends, family and actual letters. There are also never-before-seen photographs. Apparently Grand Duchess Olga, Michael's sister, not only knew Natasha, but evidently was a friend. Some of the unusual photographs in the book document this friendship. After the couple married, Olga turned her back on them. When Tsar Nicholas II abdicated, and abdicated for his young son, Michael was offered the throne, but he refused the opportunity to rule Russia because society and the Russian people would never have accepted his wife. There exists the possibility that if Michael had accepted the crown, there may have never been a Bolshevik Revolution.

One of the most fascinating books on the period that I have read. It is a powerful and tragic story and I highly recommend it.
JANA

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful "historical novel"
Review: It's official-I've lost my mind! I'm in love with a man who's been dead for 60 years. Michael Romanov was everything, apparently, a high-born nobelman was born to be; handsome, loyal, intelligent and completely besotted and in love with his bride. Unfortunately, she was a twice-divorced commoner. Therein the problems lay.

This wonderful and tragic story is so intriguing and meticulously researched that it reads like a novel rather than a biography. Donald and Rosemary Crawford play off each other's experience in journalism writing (she wrote about society, he is a hard-nosed newspaper man) to bring about an intriguing story of love and politics that takes us back to this gilded age where the rich, beautiful and tragic central figures play at being the second Russian court in exile. They have so much material (personal letters, telegrams, pictures, etc.) to use that you feel like you're a part of Michael and Natasha's lives. It's a pleasure to read and will definately be read again by me.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful "historical novel"
Review: It's official-I've lost my mind! I'm in love with a man who's been dead for 60 years. Michael Romanov was everything, apparently, a high-born nobelman was born to be; handsome, loyal, intelligent and completely besotted and in love with his bride. Unfortunately, she was a twice-divorced commoner. Therein the problems lay.

This wonderful and tragic story is so intriguing and meticulously researched that it reads like a novel rather than a biography. Donald and Rosemary Crawford play off each other's experience in journalism writing (she wrote about society, he is a hard-nosed newspaper man) to bring about an intriguing story of love and politics that takes us back to this gilded age where the rich, beautiful and tragic central figures play at being the second Russian court in exile. They have so much material (personal letters, telegrams, pictures, etc.) to use that you feel like you're a part of Michael and Natasha's lives. It's a pleasure to read and will definately be read again by me.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting but biased biography of Russia's real last Tzar.
Review: Michael and Natasha is a fascinating but deeply biased account of two nearly unknown members of the Romanov family. Granduke Michael (the actual final Tzar) and his mistress turned morganic bride Natasha. Giving us a glimpse into the life of the well-to-do in Edwardian Russia. The account of Michael's relationship with the Tzar certainly provides interesting insight into just how estranged the Tzar was from the rest of his family.

The book also gives us a glimpse into the life of one of Rasputin's assassins and an intimate of Tzar Nicholas' family the Granduke Dimitry. Dimitry was apparently one of Natasha's admirers and frequently visited her family. In my opinion this book gives a far better account of his life and character along with his motivations to kill then any other I've read. It helps you to understand his relationship with the Tzar. The only other comparable account of his life are in the memoires of his sister Marie (Once a Granduchess, etc.,)

My only annoyance with regard to this book was it's blatantly biased outlook. While well researched and very entertaining you get the feeling after a while that the authors fell almost as much in love with their book's real center piece (Natasha) as her husband Misha did. Anyone who didn't like or agree with Natasha is automatically branded a villain or a dullard.

While certainly beautiful and interesting Natasha was also a combative personality, self-centered, vain, manipulative, a shabby mother. Yet all of these faults are excused by the authors who merely go on to gush about her beauty and charm. How any man alive would have died to have her! It got nauseating at times and kept me from giving the book the five stars it otherwise deserved.

I'm afraid Natasha's charm eluded me in the midst of her many temper tantrums. I could never bring myself to sympathize with Natasha as I did with Michael. Nonetheless she was an interesting woman a deserved to be written about. Her one redeeming feature was her geniune (though not uninterested) love for the Granduke.

The description of the life led by lesser known members of the Romanov family after the Bolshevik coup alone made it worth reading. A must have for all Romanov aficionados!

Rating:
Summary: No Nicholas and Alexandra
Review: Rosemary Crawford makes a great effort to ennoble Michael and his wife Natasha as great heroes who could have headed off the Bolshevik Revolution if only they had not been stymied by the bigoted Nicholas and Alexandra. The truth is rather different. Michael was a talented man who wasted his time as a playboy when he could have been providing advice and assistance to his older brother, the Tsar. Instead of doing his duty as a Romanov and marrying a Princess ( several were willing and eager to be his bride ), he fell in love with a woman who, regardless of her beauty and elegance, must be regarded as an adventuress. Their narcissism meant Nicholas II had to worry about his younger brother's escapades when he had enough to do worrying about his empire. I find it reprehensible that Michael chose to marry Natasha at the very moment his nephew Alexis lay close to death. What is even more inexcusable is Michael's refusal to take the throne in March 1917, not from any noble motives, but from fear for his own safety. While I'm sure Nichael and Natasha were pleasant people in St. Petersburg high society, they were completely unsuitable as part of a reigning dynasty.

Rating:
Summary: Well done!
Review: This was very well done. Quite a bit of material contained within this book that I was not aware of concerning Grand Duke Michael. If one is curious about the Royal family outside of the Emperor, by all means get this book. For the serious study of the revolution, it is imperative to know how all the members of the family were involved and most interesting to read about their lives outside the realm of politics. Highly recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: Romance, Intrigue, and Insight. Could be a great play/movie
Review: What a wonderful, easy read. The authors have done a great job of decsribing the background of both Grand Duke Michael and Natasha and their love for each other. It is so good to learn of the lives of the "lesser" Romanovs. Michael is raised with the commitment to service, yet unable to find true love. And while Natasha can be viewed as very cunning and self consumed, I, as a hopeless romantic, see her as committed to Michael and supporting him and her children. As with "Elizabeth, Grand Duchess of Russia" (Alexandra's sister), it is wonderful to get an insight into other members of the royal families other than Emperors, Kings, Queens, etc. I highly recommend this book and wish I were a playwrite or screenwriter for this could be a fabulous play/movie.

Rating:
Summary: The perfect antidote to Massie's Nicholas & Alexandra
Review: While I question the authors' English usage at times, this is a good book that fills a large gap in the history of the fall of the Romanov dynasty. Whether the authors meant to show Nicholas and Alexandra as two of the biggest baddies who ever drew breath is another story, not to mention Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, usually seen as the ill used mouse of the Romanov family [due to her biographer Ian Vorres] but here, refreshingly portrayed as she was probably was; conniving and devious, with both eyes fixed on the main chance!

Michael & Natasha is a moving story of the ups and downs of Imperial fortune. A couple who were clearly in love. Natasha's foundering fortunes in exile make heartrending reading. The authors tell the story in a straigtforward manner, and the narrative flows well.

One point the authors don't quite clarify is the fact that Natasha's claim on Nicholas and Alexandra's bank account in Berlin in the 1930's was made as the beneficiary of her late son, not because she was on equal footing with the other relatives. As a morganatic wife of a Grand Duke she could not inherit, but as the mother of Michael's deceased child she could. Her action galvanized Anna Anderson's supporters to request the withdrawal of the certificate of inheritance which led to the ensuing court case to prove that Anna Anderson was Grand Duchess Anastasia. The authors claim Mrs Anderson's action failed in 1961, but in fact the case was finally abandoned in 1977, not before it was ruled 'non liquet' [that is, unsatisfactory to both parties,] in 1970. Interestingly enough, it was the bank which held the funds who wrote to Mrs Anderson to warn her of the action. Could they but have known!

I think the book is quite well researched, as the authors have been able to avoid the traps that Massie fell into in Nicholas and Alexandra.

I've read this book twice now, and it all seems so sad. That Russia was governed by such an unstable woman and that no-one could have possibly foreseen the outcome of her actions throughout the 20th century and beyond. Least of all by the remainder of the Romanov dynasty.