Brava, Ariel Lawhon, you have created a truly remarkable book--both in theme and in structure and, without revealing too much, in the amazing ending. Who wouldn't be interested in Anastasia, the youngest daughter of the last Tsar and Tsarina of Russia? She's still an enigma and a mystery and the idea that she may have survived the massacre of the entire Romanov family is such a romantic notion.
My mother-in-law was acquainted with Anna Anderson toward the end of her life when she was living in Charlottesville, Virginia. She was convinced that Anna was indeed Anastasia. When I asked her why--she replied that Anna was so sad, so royal and that it was obvious that she'd seen any tragedies in her life. I think that my practical, no-nonsense mother-in-law, too, wanted to believe in Anastasia.
The first-person narrative Ariel Lawhon has woven so well will thrill most of your readers (and anger others) but it is so well done.

Lawhon brings one of the most enduring mysteries of the twentieth century to life in this story of Anna Anderson, the woman who claimed to be the ill fated Anastasia Romanov, who supposedly died, along with her family at the hands of revolutionaries. Told from Anastasia’s point of view shortly before her family’s murder and Anna Anderson’s from 1920 to the 1970’s, this is the story that haunted people the world over. Was it possible that Anastasia had survived? It would be a miracle, but people clamored for that miracle. Lawhon examines the legend, the myth and the reality that fascinated people the world over