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    Rasputin's Daughter
    Rasputin's Daughter
    Rasputin's Daughter
    Audiobook8 hours

    Rasputin's Daughter

    Written by Robert Alexander

    Narrated by Josephine Bailey

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    With the same riveting historical narrative that made The Kitchen Boy a national bestseller and a book club favorite, Robert Alexander returns to revolutionary Russia for the harrowing tale of Rasputin's final days as told by his youthful and bold daughter, Maria. Interrogated by the Provisional Government on the details of her father's death, Maria vividly recounts a politically tumultuous Russia, where Rasputin's powerful influence over the throne are unsettling to all levels of society, and the threats to his life are no secret.

    With vast conspiracies mounting against his father, Maria must struggle with the discovery of Rasputin's true nature-his unbridled carnal appetites, mysterious relationship with the Empress, rumors of involvement in secret religious cults-to save her father from his murderers. Swept away in a plot much larger than the death of one man, Maria fmds herself on the cusp of the Russian Revolution itself. With Rasputin's Daughter, Robert Alexander once again delivers an imaginative and compelling story, fashioned from one of history's most fascinating periods that, until now, has been virtually unexplored in fiction.

    "The combination of Alexander's research and his rich characterizations produces an engaging historical fiction that offers a Rasputin who is neither beast nor saint, but merely, compellingly human."-Publishers Weekly
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateJan 1, 2006
    ISBN9781400171941
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    Reviews for Rasputin's Daughter

    3.5/5

    177 ratings17 reviews

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    • 1/5
      Wow, this book was just bad. The setting was flat. The historical period was barely touched upon. It was like gazing at a painting through a pin hole in a sheet of white paper. The focus is so tight upon Rasputin that we don't get to know his daughter, the political atmosphere, the city of St. Petersberg, nothing. We don't really even get to know Rasputin, only various things that happened to him.All the characters are flat and boring. Especially the novel's narrator, Maria who is a completely unbelievable character. She has one brief conversation with a mysterious stranger and immediately falls in love with him. For no reason. Later he betrays her and she hates him until she has another brief conversation with him after which she forgives him and loves him again. *Shockingly* he betrays her one more time at the end and reveals himself to be a conspirator. I'd seen this coming since nearly the beginning of the novel. Really the whole book was just tediously boring. Truly awful stuff.
    • 5/5
      A great historical fiction novel that traces Gigori Rasputin's final days through the eyes of his eldest daughter, Maria. I couldn't put it down.
    • 5/5
      The story opens with Maria Rasputin being interviewed by Aleksander Aleksandrovich Blok. Maria tells the story of the final week of her father, Grigori Rasputin, and who was responsible for his death.Many people saw Rasputin as a religious man and a healer. Daily people would line up outside the apartment of Rasputin for a chance he would heal them or grant special favors. Not only do the common people call upon Rasputin for help but also from the palace, the House of Romanov. He is summoned several times to save the life of Tsar Nicholas, who is heir to the throne, who is a hemophiliac. Maria doesn't deny that her father didn't suffer from "sins of the flesh". She tells of several instances where she herself witnessed her father forcing women to undress and then fondling them. If they refused he in turn refused to grant their requests. Maria worries about her father constantly and warns him to be careful. He ignores her pleas. She takes it upon herself to try and protect him. She can do little to stop those who are out to get rid of the trouble making "Crazy Monk". A very interesting look into the life of Rasputin. If was interesting to see how one man could bring down the House of Romanov. I had read this book some time back but forgotten the details. Enjoyed it just as much the second time.
    • 3/5
      3.25 starsThis is a fictional account of Rasputin (the Russian healer or womanizer, depending on the point of view), starting some time shortly before he was murdered, from the point of view his oldest daughter, Maria, a teenager. Also during this time, Maria finds her first love.This didn't draw me in liked I'd hoped. I really liked The Kitchen Boy, but this one just didn't quite interest me nearly as much. Will also say that I listened to the audio, and it wasn't done very well. The sound wasn't that great, and it would occasionally cut off – it did that a few times. I do wonder if I would have liked it more if I'd read it in print. Overall, it was ok – there were some parts that held my attention and the last bit was probably the best.
    • 3/5
      I'm rating this a little lower than "The Kitchen Boy," largely because the subject matter isn't as interesting to me (I've never found Rasputin a particularly interesting character) and the mystery wasn't as compelling. (The whole "poisoned-shot-drowned" thing was made up according to this - as historical "revelations" go, it wasn't as compelling to me as what really happened to Maria and Alexei.)Where Robert Alexander shines is his obvious love for Russian people, language and culture. His lingering descriptions of tradtional Russian meals and customs were wonderful, and really made the setting come alive.I did have a few qualms - I think choosing to show Rasputin's healing directly was a mistake. It's the kind of thing that needed to be off screen, because explanations of mystic phenomena don't work well. In addition, it forced Alexander to take a position on the question of whether Rasputin actually had healing powers, which I felt would have been better left ambiguous.I had a few other quibbles - everything I've ever read indicated that Rasputin was despised by all classes, and his association with the Empress was an unalloyed disaster. There are a couple of scenes here that feature peasants saying that the fact that a peasant like Rasputin could talk to the Tsar gave them hope.Similarly, I have a hard time believing that, in the small and crowded apartment the family lived in, so many things could be a surprise, or successfully hidden from the other inhabitants. (I'm trying not to give away too much of the plot, here.)However, I enjoyed the book, and I look forward to reading the third of the trilogy.
    • 3/5
      "Robert Alexander" is a contemporary American writer who is working on a series of books dealing with the last of the Romanovs and their fractious court. "Rasputin's Daughter" is based on real historical events, but it comes across as a little too "Hollywoodish" at times. Too many credence-stretching coincidences in the last quarter of the book, perhaps. Also, I didn't "buy" the first person narrative, supposedly in Maria Rasputina's own voice, but not really believable. Still, it was a good enough "read". Now, if I were to write a historical novel about Rasputin's daughter I'd want to include at least a little bit about her dramatic and strange life after leaving Russia - a life which included a stint in the circus as a lion tamer and another period as a steel-welder in Miami! She died in Hollywood California in 1977, at the age of 78.
    • 2/5
      I loved The Kitchen Boy, and I really wanted to like Rasputin's Daughter, but alas....I could not get into it. I did make a point of finishing it as it is a short book though. I would have liked more of a chronological time flow as I think I would have maybe had a greater appreciation of Rasputin's influence with the royal family, and the political climate which bought about his downfall and Revolution.
    • 4/5
      The first half of this book was great. I could hardly put it down. It did become a bit less interesting near the end, in my opinion. At that point, I was so drawn into it that I had to finish the book. Though this story is fiction, it is based on historical facts.
    • 5/5
      A great historical fiction novel that traces Gigori Rasputin's final days through the eyes of his eldest daughter, Maria. I couldn't put it down.
    • 4/5
      Alexander's second book on the downfall of the Romanovs read more like a novel than the first one, which made it a bit easier to take in. While The Kitchen Boy often stated sources and where the letters could now be found (archives), this time Alexander told the story here and then included more information about the real people in the back of the book. I definitely enjoyed reading this one more than The Kitchen Boy. Granted, with not nearly as much real 'evidence' to go on, it is probably more historically fictional than the first story, but I think Alexander tried to stay true in his character sketch of Rasputin and I found it quite interesting.
    • 3/5
      Not very sophisticated writing.
    • 3/5
      At first, the book held my interest. However, as I plodded along, it became over melodramatic and quite unrealistic. I grew tired of Maria's constant dodging in and out of alley's, buildings, palaces, dark streets, dark basements..on and on and on. While the story began well, it truly spun (like Rasputin) out of control and became quite unbelievable.
    • 3/5
      An interesting look at Rasputin, but it would have been nice for the author to include some information on his research, or what was fact and what from his imagination.
    • 2/5
      This is the story of the last days of the Russian mystic Rasputin, narrated by his daughter, who vacillates between great admiration for his healing powers & spirituality and disgust for his amoral excesses. Her melodramatic concern that her father is in imminent danger of being murdered--and her unrealistic ventures into the streets of St. Petersburg to find, warn, & protect him--get repetitious & tedious.
    • 3/5
      This is the fictionalized tale of Rasputin's last week, as told by his daughter. It didn't do much for me, because the story seemed overly emotional and simplified. The author did a pretty good job of weaving in historical information in a way that didn’t seem too clunky, but he did it at the expense of detail. I would have preferred an actual biography. The most interesting part of the book was the afterward that explained what happened to the real people involved after the events depicted in the novel.
    • 4/5
      Considering it's the first book I've finished in a while, I am pleased to announce I absolutely enjoyed reading it. I am a great fan of historical fiction - and I must admit about this topic I was very uninformed about. I didn't even know Rasputin had a daughter, let alone 2 of them and a son and a wife! I really enjoyed the story from her point of view and it makes one wonder if it could have in fact happened that way - of course, I do know how to separate the fact from the fiction (the timeline in the back certainly helps with that). But I do enjoy learning about history with that twist of fiction in there.
    • 4/5
      A very interesting read! Which followc the story of Rasputin's murder through the eyes of his youngest daugther Maria. Who finds out about the plot to murder him, and tries to prevent it.I do not know much about Russian History, and generally only stick to the times that i know about. But i found this very enjoyable and interesting, and now think i have uncovered another area of interest.