I must thank Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book. It was wonderful. I have become fond of reading about the Russian Revolution. The Royal family is such a sad and mysterious story.
Told in two voices, we learn the story of Sophia and her daughter Isobelle. Sophia came to New York from Russia. She was a talented art restorer. Volunteering in a hospital, she meet the man who will become Isobelle's father. He works for Fabrege. Sophia is given a tiara from the Royal Family. As the story begins, Sophia has died and Isobelle discovers the tiara, minus the jewels.
Sophia never spoke of her life in Russia. She would not speak not teach her daughter Russian. She only told her daughter that her father died in Siberia. Isabelle must find the secret of the tiara.
Isabelle is a wonderful character. A woman in the 40s working as an architect. It's a man's world and she just deal with much unfairness at work.
The ending is filled with twists and surprises.

Thank you to NetGalley and the author fir an opportunity to read this story

Book Rating : ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ 💫
Cover rating : 🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟

I really enjoyed this story told from the perspective of a mother and daughter - Sofia during and right after the First World War in Russia, and Isobelle right after World War II in NYC, as she tries to piece together her mother’s past ...

What I liked :
✔️ strong female characters - both forging careers for themselves in male dominated careers
✔️ I’ve always been fascinated by Russian history, and I loved those aspects of this story - the little tidbits of the last years of the Tsar and his family
✔️ the insights into Oak Ridge - a town that was built in the middle of the desert for the scientist that built the atomic bombs used during WWII ; and the Ghost Army !
✔️ a beautiful love story and a mystery to solve
✔️All the Agatha Christie love in this book 💜
✔️ That gorgeous cover which is what made me request this book

Fascinating! The Last Tiara by M.J. Rose had it all. There was mystery, intrigue, war, jewels, friendship, a love story and a woman in a male dominated field of work during the post World War II era. What more could you want? This book grabbed my attention and wouldn't let me go. It was so interesting.

The story takes place during two times periods and told by two different women. The mother during the fall of the Romanovs in Russia and the daughter in post World War II in New York City. I especially loved the setting in Russia, learning about their arts and life. I also enjoyed New York City in the post war time period when things were returning to normal. The author did a great job of weaving the two stories together.

This was such a rich story of relationships. She made the past come alive and I felt like I was a bystander watching it all unfold. The cover of the book is beautiful and of course the synopsis only tells you so much but, I was pleasantly surprised that this book was so much deeper and richer than I imagined.

If you love Historical Fiction, I know this book is one you will want to add to your library.
It is as multifaceted as the diamonds and jewels that are a part of The Last Tiara!

I received a copy of this book from the publisher and Netgalley for a fair and honest review. Thank you!

The Last Tiara by MJ Rose is told in alternating perspectives by both mother and daughter- Sophia Moon and Isobelle Moon. Sophia is a native of Russia and grows up with the Romanov family since her mother is their tutor. She joins the oldest royal daughters in nursing work at the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg but she longs to pursue her true passion- restoring artwork. While working as a nurse, Sophia meets the love of her life but the Revolution threatens everything she holds dear.

Isobelle lives in New York City in 1948 and works in the cut throat and sexist field of architecture. When her mother dies suddenly, Isobelle finds an extraordinary tiara hidden in the wall of their apartment. The more Isobelle begins to dig into to the history of the tiara, the more she realizes her mother kept almost everything about life in Russia hidden from her. With the help of a local jeweler, Isobelle must find answers about her mother and the tiara and discovers that the two are not what the seem.

I enjoyed this book although it did start off very slow.

3.5 stars!

Thank you Blue Box Press for this advanced copy. The Last Tiara by M.J. Rose releases February 2, 2021.

Isobelle Moon lives in New York, 1948, one of the few women architects working with a prestigious architectural firm. When her mother, Sofiya, is killed in an accident, Isobelle is left mourning the mother who shared so little of her past life in Russia. While remodeling their apartment, Isobelle comes across the skeleton of a tiara, and a depression-era sale of the gemstones that used to live inside it. Seeing this as her one chance to get to know about her mother's life growing up in Russia during WW1, Isobelle follows this clue in the hopes of finding out about not only her mother, but the father she has never known as well. Working alongside Jules, who inherited the jewelry store her mother sold her jewels at, Isobelle quickly realizes that her mother kept her secrets for a reason, and she may not get the answers she's looking for with all her digging.

The story behind this novel was interesting - the fact that Sofiya hid her entire upbringing in Russia from her daughter made this a fun mystery to follow along with. The dual timelines, between post-WW2 America and during and post-WW1 in Russia made for a great historical fiction, but the characters were what made this a difficult read. The history behind the Romanov family and their history within the Russian revolution was super intriguing. Isobelle was definitely struggling with the death of her mother and having no answers for who she is, or who her father is. However, her self-esteem was so jaded, that the entire book she is putting herself down, and it became really annoying. With the love interest involved, Isobelle merely sits there and tells herself she isn't worthy of love, she isn't beautiful or lovable, and it really took away from the story for me. Not that low self-esteem isn't a character trait that I couldn't get around, but when it is brought up consistently, that takes away from any development I could see. I did enjoy the characters, and the love development, but there were many aspects of the writing that I couldn't get over.

Overall, good story, good history, the ending was a surprise twist and made the whole story worth reading for me.

Unable to face the memories of her life in Russia, Sophia Moon never shared her story with her daughter Isobelle. Now Sophia is dead and Isobelle fears that she will never know her mother’s story. While renovating her mother’s room to make it her own, she discovers a hidden recess in the wall. Inside is a box containing a tiara, its’ jewels removed, and receipts for the sale of the jewels. This is the first clue to the family’s history.

In 1915 St. Petersburg Sophia is friends with Grand Duchess Olga, daughter of the Tsar, and they have volunteered at the hospital that was set up in the Winter Palace. It is here that Sophia meets the soldier with no name or memory. As she spends her time reading to him they discover a mutual attraction and she is determined to help him remember. She calls him Carpathian, for the area where he was found. His true name is Sergei and he worked for Faberge. He was also in a loveless marriage, but his heart now belongs to Sophia. As he is recovering the political situation is deteriorating. Olga fears for her family’s future and she presents Sophia with a gift to remember their friendship. It is the last tiara created by Faberge for the Tsar as a gift for Olga’s last birthday.

Isobelle is an architect, a career open to few women in 1948. It is a man’s world and she is relegated to providing designs that her team leader takes credit for. She has been betrayed in a past relationship and is now slow to trust. She is also inquisitive and finding the tiara sends her to the jewelry firm that purchased the gems. The firm is now run by Jules Reed, the jeweler’s grandson. He is intrigued by Isobelle and her story and promises to help her discover the tiara’s history. He is also a member of the Midas Society that returns stolen art and antiquities to their rightful owners.. This leads Isobelle to question whether he truly wants to help or is he working to recover the tiara.

M. J. Rose reveals Sophia’s story and Isobelle’s search in alternating chapters. She brings her characters to life with all of their loves and struggles. From the deprivations of revolutionary Russia to the lack of opportunities for women after WWII, her writing is elegant and easily allows the reader to visualize the scenes and characters. Rose is a must read for fans of historical fiction. I would like to thank NetGalley and Blue Box Press for providing this book in exchange for my review.

Love love this story!!!!!!!!! The two tales of two strong women in this book was emotional, uplifting, sad, but so inspirational. This new book of author MJ Rose was a moving tale of a mother's struggles & her journey which she would never tell her daughter. Until it was too late. Thank you to Netgalley and BlueBox Press for my honest review.

Isabelle is moving back into her mother's apartment after her mother dies. They have always been close. Sophia emigrated to New York from Russia when Isabelle was a few months old. In the process of renovating the apartment she rips off the wallpaper behind the bed and finds a hidden niche in the wall hiding a leather case containing a tiara without stones. Her mother never talked about her past in Russia and she only knows her father by the name Carpathian. Her mother said she preferred to forget the bad memories. From that point the story is told in two timelines with Sophia's starting in 1913. It is the start of the revolution and she is working as a nurse with Olga, one of the Tsar's daughters. There she falls in love with a patient. He has amnesia and she is helping him find his identity. The second time line is Isabelle's in 1948. She begins to search for the origin of the tiara, how did her mother get it and what happened to the stones.

This is a time where I really felt the two timelines worked. As we went back and forth the chapters complimented each other so well and I didn't feel cheated when I had to abandon one and go on to the next. I enjoyed the growth of both the characters. Sophia was young during the Revolution, only 19, and the author really depicts the turmoil in the country at the time as she pursues her career as an art restorer and falls in love. Isabelle's story is also compelling. She is an architect, which is a rare field for a woman to be in. She is trying to move ahead in her field and as she looks for the mystery behind the tiara I see her growing in self confidence.

This is kind of a slow mystery, the ending didn't have my heart racing but it was still very satisfactory. I look forward to more books by M.J. Rose.

Thank you to Netgalley and Blue Box Press for providing me a copy of this book.

Lovely mystery of a tiara discovered hidden with the jewels missing.

Isobelle Moon is renovating her place that she shared with her recently passed mother. She discovers a tiara, jewels missing and in a blue case, hidden. Her mother Sophia never talked about her life in Russia so Isobelle had no idea where it came from.
Sofiya is a friend of Princess Olga, the Czar of Russia's daughter. They work together in the Winter Palace as nurses to help soldiers in the war recover. Sofiya will befriend and fall in love with one of the men.

This was a great mystery to follow and find out all the secrets of this tiara and Isobelle's mother and her life. It was very captivating and immersive into New York in 1948 and Russia in 1916-1922.

I love the story's premise—the mystery of the tiara from two separate timelines—that of a mother’s perspective, Sofiya Petrovitch in 1915, and her daughter Isobelle Moon, 1948.

Though it is the secrets surrounding the diadem that held my interest for almost three-quarters of the way through the book, it wasn’t enough to sustain it.

I never felt fully submerged in the narrative and the characters' lives as there was more telling than showing throughout, pulling me out of the story.

THE LAST TIARA may not have ticked all the boxes for me; I am, however, looking forward to reading more by Rose.

Thank you, NetGalley and Blue Box Press, for loaning me an eGalley of THE LAST TIARA in exchange for an honest review.

Scheduled To Release – February 2, 2021 (Subject To Change)

Wonderful dual story of Romanov Russia and 1948 NYC. A passionate quest to find an historic tiara and the story surrounding it leads characters to discover as much about themselves as the jeweled item itself.
Author consistently writes fascinating stories with intriguing characters.
Thanks to #NetGalley and #TheLastTiara for an advance digital copy.

This is a must read for fans who are fascinated by books about the Romanov's, Russia's last Imperial family.

Set between Russia during the time just before and during the Revolution and New York City it is the tale of a mother and daughter.

Sophia Moon (Sofyia Petrovitch) is a friend of the Grand Duchess Olga and they are volunteers at a hospital that once was the Winter Palace. Olga gifts Sofyia with a tiara which was gifted to her from her father the Tsar.
It is the "last tiara" that Faberge (the renowned jewelers make). The tiard has diamonds and sapphires on it and it becomes a great mystery in the future years.

Isabelle (Sophia's daughter) knows nothing of her mother's life in Russia as her mother never wants to revisit painful memories.. All she knows is that her mother escaped Russia when Isabelle was an infant.

Upon her mother's death when Isabelle is rennovating her mother's bedroom she comes upon a hidden niche in the wall and discovers the tiara which at this time is missing its jewels, and a receipt for payment of the jewels. . She also finds a photograph and a letter.
She has never met her father or seen a picture of him ,, all she knows is that he was killed while in a Russian prison.

Isabelle .goes to the jeweler who paid her mother for the jewels and discovers there is a secret society whose purpose is to return stolen jewels, paintings and other artifacts to their owners. Unable to verify where her mother obtained the tiara , it is discovered to have been the property of the grand Duchess but is thought to have been stolen

There are many mysteries and secrets in this book.

This tiara actually existed and is still missing, having last been seen in 1921-22 when it was photographed for a catalog.

M.J. Rose’s latest book focuses on a tiara that was once owned by the Romanov family (and is actually still missing today), and her reimagining of what could have happened to this priceless artifact. When her mother Sophia dies in 1948 Manhattan, Isobelle stumbles across a tiara, stripped of all of its jewels, hidden in their shared apartment. As she researches the mysterious tiara, she learns more about her mother’s past, something Sophia would never speak about when she was alive. In 1915 Russia, Sofiya Petrovitch and her close friend Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna tend to injured troops on the grounds of the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg where Sophia falls in love and sets in motion events that eventually cause her to flee to the United States. Told in alternating perspectives and time periods, the tales of the two young women slowly unfold as the mystery of the tiara is ultimately resolved.

Courtesy of NetGalley I received the ARC of The Last Tiara by M.J. Rose. I was immediately drawn into this story of family, romance, and secrets set in WWI Russia during the rein of the Romanovs, and post WWII NYC. A young female architect, Isobelle, is mourning the accidental death of her mother and discovers a hidden tiara somehow linked to her mother's Russian past. During her journey to learn it's significance, Isobelle meets a young jeweler who leads her towards the answers she seeks, and the revelations from her mother's past. Surprises and twists end this gripping historical novel! A captivating take!

The Last Tiara takes place in Russia during the revolution, and in the US after the Second World War. I really liked the dual timeline, and how we had to figure out what happened in Russia during the revolution. The book starts with Isobelle finds a silver tiara that belonged to her mother, and she spends the rest of the book figuring out how Isobelle's mother came to have the tiara, and how she came to the US.
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I loved the characters in this book. Sofiya was loving and compassionate, and she volunteers as a nurse during the First World War. Through this, she meets a young soldier and enters into a love affair that is rickety and unstable. Isobelle is kind and caring like her mother, but she is also strong willed and determined. She is really smart and works as an architect, a male dominated sphere. She was determined to figure out her mothers past, and it was fun to go on this journey with her.
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CW: death, loss of a loved one.

Isobelle Moon discovers a long kept secret from her mother. She finds hidden inside a wall an artifact that goes back to a historic time from their country of origin. The story alternates from the mother's past to the daughter's present. Isobelle has to find out what and why her mother Sofiya could not share her past with her. It is a love story gone wrong through a time of revolution that sends Sofiya to America leaving her family and the love of her life behind to start a new life. A very good story that is a bit sad but endearing, too.

I received this ARC for an honest review. Thank you #Netgalley

I received a free electronic ARC of this novel from Netgalley, M. J. Rose, and BlueBoxPress. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this novel of my own volition and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work. M. J. Rose writes a tight, compelling historical and this book is up to the mark, an interesting and much deeper look into the women of the Romanovs as the revolution in Russia removed the family from power.

We see this take from two different perspectives, crossing time. This spread across stories and time is handled very well. The breaks from place-to-place, time to time, are handled very cleanly and you are never in doubt of where you are or when.

Sofiya Petrovich introduces us to the Russian royals as she brings us their story from Petrograd (St. Petersburg) as the Winter Palace becomes a medical hospital for the war-wounded of the Russian Revolution and WWI in the summer of 1915. The tsarina and her daughters work at the hospital as did their dear friend Sofiya. At the end of 1921 with a baby coming, her lover Carpathian arrested, shipped to Siberia, and reported dead, with all of her friends and family disappeared, Sofiya immigrates to New York City with a small case of personal items and a tiara gifted to her by her dearest friend Princess Olga, made especially for the princess by the St. Petersburg House of Faberge for her 14th birthday. Sofiya, who changed her name to Sofia Moon at Ellis Island, gives us New York City in the years between the Wars.

And her daughter, Isobelle, joins the tale, bringing us into World War II in NYC. Sofia would never speak of the old world to her daughter, and after her death, Isobelle finds herself alone and needing to understand her mother's life - and see her own in perspective. She needs to know about her father, her extended family, the life Sofiya left behind in 1922, in order to figure out who she herself is, what she needs from life, where she is going in this world today. And then while stripping her mother's very pink bedroom for redecoration she finds the silver frame of the tiara and receipts for the missing stones hidden in a nitch between boards and wallpapered over. The receipts only add to the mystery of her mother's past. They take her to Tiffany's showroom and fully immerse her in yet another mystery...

Altogether, an engrossing tale that keeps you reading far into the night.

A charming but insubstantial dual-timeline historical fiction offering, pairing the mother's experience in the 1910s and early 1920s in Russia with the daughter's experience in post-WWII New York City. By trying to untangle the stoneless frame of a tiara found hidden in the wall of her mother's apartment, our protagonist goes on a physical and emotional journey involving a secret society focused on restoring stolen pieces to their proper owners, two men claiming to be the father she thought had been dead for years, a potential love-interest jeweler, and her own trust issues about men and governments after working at Oak Ridge during the war. A pleasant read, but it fades quickly from the memory.

This was a relatively lightweight historical fiction story that was a quick and easy read. Told in alternating timelines between a mother and daughter set in Russia and New York approximately 30 years apart, it was equal parts love story and mystery. It was the story of the love between a young girl in revolutionary Russia and a soldier with amnesia and the story of the search by her daughter for the truth of her heritage. It was well researched and, while it could have been a longer, darker novel, I’m glad it wasn’t. I enjoyed that the author concentrated on more superficial details. I liked reading the descriptions of rooms and menus, etc.; especially the ones in 1948. I can also see this being the start of series about the Midas Society featuring Jules and Isobelle.

My copy of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. My thanks to the the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review it.

The Last Tiara by M. J. Rose is a three-way trip through history. The novel centers around two love stories and the mystery of a tiara. The story of Sofiya Petrovitch and her one true love Carpathian takes place in 1915 Russia. Together they attempt to keep their love alive while withstanding the terrors of the Russian revolution. The story of Isobelle Moon and Jules happens in 1948 New York. Both Isobelle and Jules are distrustful of relationships, but through the mystery of a tiara designed by Faberge, they learn about love and trust. The book is written in alternating views and moves each relationship forward with every chapter. The discovery of the history of the tiara and the resolution of relationships, both old and new, makes for a book that will hold your attention and that you will enjoy.