Anastasia's Album - Hardcover

Brewster, Hugh

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0316880213 ISBN 13: 9780316880213

Publisher: Little, Brown, 1996

Synopsis

Shielded from St Petersburg society, the last tsar's four daughters enjoyed a simple life of almost cloudless happiness. Their evenings were spent with their parents, reading aloud and pasting snapshots into albums. Drawing on these precious personal keepsakes - long hidden in Russian archives - this work offers a glimpse into the intimate family life of the last Romanovs. Illustrated in scrapbook style with Anastasia's own letters, photographs and watercolours, this album brings the youngest of the tsar's daughters to life - a tomboy who scrambled up snowy mountains to sled down on a silver tray. Letters from Anastasia's final heartbreaking days in captivity show that even the filthy conditions and the brutal treatment of her revolutionary jailers could not shake her faith.

About this title

From Booklist

Gr. 5^-8. Readers may not know who Anastasia is when they begin this book, but they will long remember her once they are finished. The cover of the handsomely conceived volume features a photograph of Anastasia, the last czar's youngest daughter, smiling slightly at her audience. Despite Anastasia's pearls and lace dress, readers will have no trouble identifying with her. Inside, they will find a design made to mimic a family photo album. The czar and his family were great photographers, and they spent many hours pasting pictures in their albums. Anastasia and her sisters added their own decorations of plants and flowers, which also appear here. The book moves in chronological order: there is Anastasia as a baby, then with her three older sisters and younger brother; as the clown of the family; on holiday; and later as a prisoner of the revolutionaries. Inset are color photos of imperial relics that have survived to become museum pieces: a doll, a gorgeous Fabergeegg, a toy cannon. The text, which features snippets of the writings of Anastasia and other Romanovs, sets Anastasia within her historical milieu and offers insight into both her character and her life. Young people who do not know the story of the Russian royal family may be shocked by its end; the book does not sensationalize the deaths, but the impact is powerful. The flap copy gives only a tantalizing bit of information about the author finding the imperial family's albums at the State Archives in Moscow and deciding that Anastasia's writings and photos would make a compelling book. How he went about compiling his materials would make an interesting story in its own right. Ilene Cooper

From Kirkus Reviews

The execution of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and his family in 1918 has long been shrouded in mystery: ``For more than eighty years, the diaries, letters, and photo albums of the tsar's family were kept a secret.'' Now they are displayed in the State Archives in Moscow. Much of Brewster's book reproduces pictures from the photo album made by Anastasia, the youngest of the tsar's four daughters, and quotes many of her letters to her father and friends. It reveals not only Anastasia's daily life with her family but her wonderful sense of humor. The four daughters--Marie, Tatiana, Olga, and Anastasia--are shown posed (usually dressed identically) in lovely photographs; or riding bikes, swimming, sailing, walking in the snow, studying, painting, knitting. Many of the black-and-white photos were hand-colored by Anastasia. A particularly impish photo of the girls with their hats in their hands reveals their baldness after a bout of the measles. Although an epilogue discussing an impostor's claiming to be Anastasia detracts from the focus, this is a story of a close, happy family that does not foretell their violent end. (full-color and b&w photos, glossary, bibliography) (Nonfiction. 7+) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Little, Brown
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0316880213
• ISBN 13: 9780316880213
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 64