Romanov

This Post is Spoiler Free!

I made the mistake of not writing down my feelings directly after reading Romanov by Nadine Brandes, and now it’s been almost a week and I feel lost. This has nothing to do about how much I liked the book, because I liked it a lot. I just finished it at three in the morning, fell directly to sleep, and didn’t have time to write my review when I woke up.

And then I procrastinated.

But, it’s Tuesday, my usual blog post day, and I figured I should really, really get to this. So, here I am! Talking about Romanov! To start, I want to just mention that this book is pretty much split into two parts: the true story of the Romanov family, and a daring fantasy story. For the most part, the true story is told in the first half and the fantasy story is told in the second half, but they do intermix a bit to make one cohesive book (which mostly worked, aside from the pacing… I’ll touch on that later).

The true parts of the story were, from the bit of research that I have done in the past and while reading this book, pretty spot on. It was super interesting to read, actually, because Brandes even included some recorded dialogue from the past, yet it was told in a light that felt new (most likely because it was told from a fictional Anastasia’s perspective). It was really interesting. The fictional part of the story was also fascinating. I loved how Brandes incorporated magic. I loved Anastasia’s character development. It all was awesome. 

The only problem I had with the book was the pacing. The first half, which was mainly the true story, was told at a fairly leisurely pace, which I didn’t mind. I actually love books that go along slowly and steadily. However, the entire last half was told at an almost frantic pace. Everything happened so quickly and so radically, which again, I normally don’t mind—I really do like books that are action packed. It just didn’t fit with the first half as well as I would have liked.

All in all, though, Romanov was a pretty good book to end my 2020 reading year. It also was fun because I’m trying to learn Russian right now. Brandes included little bits and phrases in Russian, and every time I came across them (and I actually knew all of them!) I found myself saying them outloud. I actually startled Nikolai (my kitty) when I got super excited and shouted Здравствуйте (Zdravstvuyte—a formal hello), but he forgave me fairly quickly.

Anywho, I quite enjoyed this book, and if you’re looking for an interesting historical fiction/fantasy, I’d suggest Romanov!

What was your last read of 2020? What about your first read of 2021?

Books by Nadine Brandes

Romanov

Out of Time (Trilogy)

Fawkes

My Next Read:

Artemis
by Andy Weir