⭐⭐⭐💫

Firstly, I'd like to thank @stmartinspress and @netgalley for providing me with this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Tsarina first caught my attention with it's cover. I saw murderer and it piqued my interest. Then, I saw a few people compare it to Game of Thrones and that was enough to send me over to Netgalley to request it and hope for the best. 

This book was more dense than I expected coming in, so it took me quite some time to get through. However, I have been in a more thriller/mystery type mood, so it has taken me longer to read other genres. While it was a book I really had to pace myself to get through, the writing is impressive. It is rich in historical details, and @ellenalpsten_author does not shy away from the darker, more brutal details either, which I never mind! An absolutely gripping read that I would highly suggest for anyone in a historical fiction mood! This book comes out November 10, 2020- so if you've been eyeing it, go grab it soon!

A historical fiction based on the real life second wife of Peter the Great, Tsar of Russia in the early 1700's.  Remember as you read this that women were not contributing members of society in this era.  As this young woman moves from a life of poverty and servitude to become the ruler of Russia during an era when the country ruled a huge empire, she had to endure many hardships and indignities that were common place for women.  It is a very compelling story, readers get a vision of a life lived for the moment, indulging appetites with no care for the consequences.

Ellen Alpsten has written an excellent story of a woman who has vanished from most Russian history books, over shadowed by Catherine the Great, Catherine Alexeyevna is a fascinating character.

Ellen Alpsten's TSARINA is the story of Catherine the First of Russia, a girl born as Marta into utter poverty who ultimately rose to rule Russia after the death of the tsar Peter the Great. The story had its moments, powerful scenes that gripped my imagination and taught me about a time and place that I knew nothing about, but the moments were all too few, scattered in a torturous slog through ever-present cold, privation, manipulation, cruelty, never-ending focus on power and money, conquering, hierarchy, and savage gamesmanship. The novel felt overlong, that huge swaths of it could have been dropped and others trimmed to a sentence or two. For all the inner dialogue and supposed inner thinking and feeling of Marta, I never felt like I really understood her -- or ultimately cared. Alpsten crafts a believable reality for the reader to experience an unknown and unknowable time in a foreign world that might have done better with more sympathetic, fully developed characters -- without the people, the story felt more contrived set piece than story about real people. I received an advance reader copy of the novel from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my unbiased review.

Tsarina
By Ellen Alpsten 
3.75 ⭐
#NetGalley #ARC 
Decades long epic story of the Tsarina written as a really long flash back. Book starts near the end and shifts all the way back to the beginning of the Marta/Catherine story. Story all told in first person from the Tsarina's POV. Loved most of the descriptions. Very creative. I learned a lot about that time in history that I knew very little about. I previously knew nothing about Peter I or his reign. 

But, unfortunately, I felt that the writing just didn't flow easily, smoothly as I would have liked/expected for such great descriptive details. I also felt like the medical happenings in the book were too 20 century. They had different names back then for most of what the author presented. 

It also bothered me that there was no separation within the chapters. This would not have bothered me if there weren't jumps in time. Occasionally, there was  jump of many months or years in a sentence, in the middle of a paragraph in the middle of a chapter, with no shown break in the chapter itself.

I would try something else by this author in the future, preferably if the book was shorter.

I don't know much about Russian history, so I immediately scoured Wikipedia for details of Catherine I. It appears that Alpsten did her research (at least, according to my cursory glance at the info) when describing how Catherine rose from serf to maid to tsarina of Russia and Peter I's wife. She also stuck to the stereotype of Russian (or, in this case, Russian-themed) literature being nasty, brutish, and long; there's tons of horrifying events packed into this book. It wasn't easy to read, but I felt compelled to keep going. 

This is a great pic for fans of historical fiction who can stomach more than the gentler Tudor novels.

What an amazing story.
I was a bit hesitant to start the 480 pages thinking it might be hard to finish but I flew through the pages.  
The book is listed as a Novel which gives some wiggle room on the facts but after looking up some items because I wanted to know more it looked like Ellen Alspen whenever possible tried to accurate portray the facts.    I love to read historical books because I always learn something new and it is fascinating to get a better understanding of what live was like.  That said if you are a person that disliked a book because of the treatment of woman or can’t have an objective view of the cruelty described then do not read this book.
Not having read many historical books on Russia of that time period about the only items I knew about Peter the Great was his obsession with Western Europe, construction of St. Petersburg and the constant wars. 
The one thing that surprise me that Catherine never learned to read or write because she was an intelligent woman and must have realized that it could be important for her to be able to do so. Too bad she only had two years of ruling Russia after Peter’s dead before she died herself.

I've been reading horror novels for forty years or more and have never read anything quite as horrifying as this historic tale of Russia. I have always found that historical fiction does a far better job of putting past events into context than any textbook. Books about Russia, fiction, non-fiction or historical fiction, are not easy to read. The first hurdle is figuring out just who's who. In TSARINA, not only must one deal with the names themselves but also keep track of the multiple names for a single person.

Peter, tsar of all the Russias, was a sadist and syphilitic whoremonger and Marta loved him. TSARINA tells of the meteoric rise of a poor girl named Marta to become the consort of the tsar, then his wife, and upon his death the ruler of all the Russias. It was Peter that gave her the name Catherine. It would seem that names were fleeting and could be changed on a whim.

It is difficult to say that I enjoyed reading TSARINA, and it is equally difficult to say that I did not. I definitely learned things about Russian history previously unknown to me. In addition, the book provides insight not only to Russian attitudes toward women from an historical perspective, it shows that today's attitudes have not changed all that much. Feminists, no matter their gender, will have a hard time reading parts of this book.

Fans of big sweeping historical fiction should pick this up and settle in for a good read.  Alpstein has written the unlikely story of Catherine I, who was born a serf and ultimately rules Russia.  There's so much drama here that you might forget that it is based on reality= that these things, these people were real.   Catherine leaps to life in a way that actually surprised me; I found myself caught up in her world from the start, which is a tribute to the writing.  You, like me, might find yourself doing a bit of additional research on some of those you will meet and I appreciated the chance to learn more.  Thanks to the publisher for reissuing this and for the ARC.  It's a terrific one.

Historical novels give the reader a glimpse into how life was like in another time.  And during the period that the novel Tsarina, by Ellen Alpsten, takes place, life is brutal for women.  This book is filled with all the historical details that brings this book to life.  I really enjoyed that.  But this book is also hyper-focused on how men brutally prey on women.  There are MANY scenes of rape, incest, and other brutality in this book.  While I know that it is probably a realistic scenario, it was tough to read through.  


What I Liked:

Historical Details:

The author clearly did a ton of research on life in the late 1600's.  As Marta moves up the social ladder, from serf, to servant, to mistress, and finally to Tsarina, the reader sees how each level of society lives.  The serf's life is one of hard work and servitude.  Marta and her family have a very basic existence.  But everything depends on the whims of the rich landlords.  As Marta moves up the social ladder, she is able to eat, and dress better.  Yet each situation she is in reveals a new brutality, a new humiliation that she must endure.

Story Structure:

I liked the structure of the book.  We see two timelines.  In one, we see the critical moments after Marta's husband, Peter The Great, has died.  Will she be executed?  Sent to a nunnery?  Or will she be able to remain the Tsarina.

We find out more about Marta in a series of flashbacks.  Starting from her childhood, and moving from her time as a servant, to a young wife, to becoming a mistress to the Tsar, we see how Marta has become the cunning, ruthless woman who just may be able to finally seize her own destiny.

 

What I Didn't Like:

 

Main Character:

Although I could feel sympathy for Marta being used and abused by men,  I found her to be an extremely unlikable character.  She is a survivor.  But the way she survives is by conveniently overlooking Peter's cruelty, and actively abusing others.  And when a woman tries to come between her and Peter, she has no problem ruining her rival's life.  This made it impossible to root for her. 

Hyper-Focus on Sexual Assault:

I know that Marta lived a life where rape and control was how men operated, but this was very hard to read.  Again and again, Marta is raped, beaten, and brutalized.  I didn't like the implied notion that this was happening to due to her astounding beauty.  Rape is about power and control.  It can happen to anyone.  At one point there is another girl who is being raped, as well.  She was probably beautiful at one point, but due to the repeated sexual assaults, she has become sickly and dangerously thin.  But the overall implication was that Marta's beauty was a curse.  It's only when she learns to "use" her beauty to manipulate others, that she gains any power.  What a lesson, huh?

Ending:

The whole book with it's two timelines (her rise to become the consort of the Tsar of Russia, and her rise even further to become the Tsarina) is a build up to when Marta becomes the sole ruler of Russia.  But the book abruptly ends just as Marta gains control and becomes the Tsarina.  With so much buildup, I wanted to see how she would rule, would she become a more benevolent ruler than Peter?  Will there be treachery?  Will others conspire against her?  There were many unanswered questions that I really wanted answers to.  It made for a very unsatisfying ending. 

 Trigger Warning for extreme violence against women

An epic story about a fascinating woman. History unfolds in a vivid and colorful way in this book about the life of Catherine and Peter the Great. Not a book for the squeamish as it is filled with blood and gore, torture and desolation, intrigue and betrayal and an overwhelming bond that this couple shared. The writing at times was a little heavy, but I couldn’t put this book down!

This book was not what I was expecting.  I was too long and a little heavy on the bodice-ripping for me. I couldn't finish it.

Providing insight into a time when Russia was a world power, this is the story of Catherine. She is a woman who came from nothing to becoming the Empress of Russia.  But as other sweeping historical fiction has shown, it is difficult to write a book like this without becoming monotonous.

Not gonna lie: when I requested this book, I thought it was about Catherine the Great. I quickly realized it was not and still thoroughly enjoyed it. Historical Russian fiction focusing on someone other than the Romanovs was unique, interesting, and -albeit depressing- a breath of fresh hair. There’s a lot of war and a lot of childbirth... honestly, lots of stuff that was sort of repetitive and I tended to skim. Her impoverished early days are horrifying and sad. The way women were treated at this time in history is pretty disturbing, but this book has a great take on a mostly un-talked-about time period and a historical leader that isn’t often looked at so closely. I felt a kinship to Catherine I, which I wouldn’t probably have discovered otherwise. I’d definitely recommend this to any fans of historical fictions - specifically Russian history.

Interesting period but lengthy & too much detail🙄

The life story of Peter the Great's second wife, raised from poverty and obscurity and Peter's partner during his creation of Saint Petersburg and attempts to make Russia a great Western power, was a compelling basis for a story.  It's obvious that the author did painstaking research in her effort to recreate Caterina and Peter's world.  Caterina/Marta's journey from contented but poor and illiterate serf's daughter to palace seems incredible.  I found her life before Peter the most interesting part of the book.  Once the story moves to her time with the Tsar it became more about him, his ambition, lust and cruelty than about Caterina.  In fact, after the big climax of Peter the Great's death, the story ends quickly without much coverage of her years ruling Russia on her own.

I think that the book was way too long and bogged down by endless description that dominated instead of the action.  And the action there was seemed to concentrate on cruelty, torture and violence.  Too much harsh reality for me.

Thanks to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for providing an advance copy of the book;  this is my voluntary and honest review.

Catherine the Great rose from poor and humble beginnings and managed to become the wife of Peter the Great in Russia.  I was very interested in Peter’s efforts to make Russia a more refined, cultural and respected nation, on par with major European countries.  One of the ways he did this was to build St. Petersburg on what was formerly a swamp.  Victory over the Swedes gave Russia access to the Baltic Sea, a key strategy for them.  I was fortunate to visit St. Petersburg last year, so I was interested to hear of it’s beginnings and the building of Catherine Palace, Alexander Palace and Peterhof.  The Russian court in 1725 was wild, violent and drunk.  Catherine delivered 13 children and only 2 reached adulthood. Peter suffered from syphilis and did unspeakable things to his family and citizens.  This book is fiction but heavily based on fact and well-researched.

Reading Ellen Alpsten's historical epic was like reading a Phillipa Gregory novel set in Russia. This book has all the soapy drama and political/interpersonal machinations that Gregory is known for; only the setting is different. I have long been interested in Russia's Romanov dynasty, and I enjoyed reading this fictional account of Peter the Great through the eyes of his second wife, Catherine I. Peter was a truly horrible person, at least from the perspective of this novel. He was barbarous, arrogant, unfaithful, and terrifying in so many respects. But that's what makes him interesting, I suppose. 

Catherine's life story begins in her early, formative years. We watch her go from the peasantry to the aristocracy, and suffer through rape and heartbreak on her climb to power. At times the book succumbs to sensationalism. Since I only have a surface level knowledge of these historical figures, I'm not sure how many liberties the author took with their lives, and I can only hope that the reality was a little more nuanced and subdued than the drama contained in these pages. All the same, the excess is what makes the book interesting.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest opinions.

Tsarina tells the story of Peter the Great’s second wife, born of very humble beginnings and a former washerwoman.  Marta, renamed Catherine Alexeyevna by Peter, ultimately became the Empress of Russia.  Her life was never easy, 12 pregnancies with only 3 daughters that lived past the age of 1.  Imagine losing so many babies, especially the few males that Peter was so determined to have.  Threatened by Peter’s constant stream of mistresses as well as by his son from his first marriage, she used her intellect to weave through the constant roadblocks.  My heart broke reading the graphic description of her lover, Wilhelm’s, gruesome death.  Also when reading about Alexey’s torture and death.
Women were merely pawns and treated as possessions by the men in power during Peter the Great’s reign.  In this respect Catherine fared well, even after being raped by looting soldiers.  She was rescued by a man who became her life long friend, then was taken by his superior, who also became a friend, and finally caught the eye and heart of a Peter.   Catherine earned their respect and support by treating them all with kindness and compassion.  I cannot imagine living during that time, especially in brutally cold Russia.  Interesting reading about how Saint Petersburg was built as well as reading about the other famous palaces I have read about in other books.  It was also interesting to read of the battles between Sweden and Russia.  
The disparity between those in power and the poor souls starving throughout Russia was chilling, although expected.  Alpsten pointed out several times that the money spent for Catherine’s crown for example would have fed so many for a very long time.  
I can’t help but think that Peter’s syphilis caused him to have the rages he had and contributed to the loss of so many of his babies.
Altogether an interesting portrayal of a woman who overcame so many obstacles and tragedies in her life.  3 1/2 stars.
Many thanks to Ellen Alpsten, St. Martin’s Press, and NetGalley for affording me the opportunity to read an ARC of this soon to be published book.

Following in the vein of the best of Russian literature, this is a symphony of suffering offset by the highs of life and love.
A fictionalized telling of the life of Russia's Catherine The Great, this book goes deep into the horrors that life in Russia was for pretty much every single living soul in the 18th century. Through Marta (later in life renamed Catherine by Tsar Peter I) we see every step in the hierarchy of lives and how quickly things can take a turn. Alpsten goes all-in when it comes to showcasing how little worth the poor had in Russia, seen merely as souls to be sold, traded or awarded by those in power. Through Marta, the reader gets a chance to experience life as a serf, a servant, a prisoner of war, a mistress to the most powerful man in Russia, a courtier, and an empress with no power. 
Along the way, Alpsten also expertly displays the ostentatiousness of life at court and how fragile things were with a Tsar that was never satisfied and, quite honestly, more than a little crazy. 
Alpsten truly breathes life into her Tsarina and even though it is hard to read at times, it's a delight to see her evolve and rise up to the challenges that life threw her way. 
Definitely a read worthy of history buffs, drama fanatics, or anyone looking for a deep dive into history as seen through the lens of a strong woman.

Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the early read.

I am always interested in reading history and historical fiction, and although I know little about Russia (and maybe because of that lack), I decided to read “Tsarina.” From the beginning, author Ellen Alpsten wove a fascinating story about Catherine Alexeyeva, a woman who rose from being a serf to becoming an empress and ruler of Russia.

The description captivated my attention in the early chapters, adding an extra layer that is sure to delight any reader. However, it is the history of Catherine (born Marta) that carried me through the book, a lifetime that seemed to attract more than her share of luck. As the book continued, Ms. Alpsten demonstrated how Catherine’s cleverness helped control some of the events in her life. One can also see a shift as Catherine slowly gives up her innocence as she relies more on her wit and subtle manipulation efforts. 

The story reads like a good novel as Catherine moves from one crisis to the next. True to the book’s title, Catherine is the main character. While there are mentions of the military aspects of Russia and the influence of Peter on the Russian people, the focus is on Catherine. The author appears to have gone to great lengths to represent the era when the story takes place, and has included some of the torturous and barbaric acts performed as well as  descriptive sex scenes. Despite the 480 page count, I found this book to move along fairly quickly. Four stars.

My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for a complimentary electronic copy of this title.

I was really looking forward to this book because I'm interested in Russian history and I like historical fiction. I also studied Russian folklore so I love the details of a humble Russian home that seem straight out of a folktale. The whole family sleeping atop the oven, etc.

Then the brutal rapes began. All rapes are brutal, but these are on page, described in detail.

And there is no historical evidence for them, according to the sources I checked?

I will never understand why some people are obsessed with the "historical accuracy" of women being raped. What does it say about an author that she feels compelled to fill in the mysterious youth of Catherine I with rape? The absolute laziest tragic backstory ever. It just makes me angry.