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Showing posts from September, 2021

Elizabeth, Empress of Russia by Tamora Talbot Rice: A Book Review

Elizabeth, Empress of Russia Author: Tamora Talbot Genre: Nonfiction, History, Biography Publisher: Weidenfeld & Nicolson Release Date: 1970 Pages: 231 Source: My State Public Library Synopsis: Born in 1709, the illegitimate daughter of Peter the Great and a woman of Livonian yeoman stock, Elizabeth was the only on of the Tsar's many children to survive to maturity. She lived through the reigns of four monarchs after her father's death, before seizing the throne in 1741 at the age of thirty-two. Faced with governing a country made unstable by frequent changes of ruler and caught up in web of international politics, she evolved a policy that set Russia on the road to becoming a major Western power. Elizabeth, beautiful, vivacious and immensely popular, with some of her father's genius for government, was often irresolute and fickle. She was a paradoxical woman - generous and spontaneous yet capable of inflicting the most savage of punishments, vain and hedonistic yet wit

Curse of the Gypsy (Lady Anne Addison Mysteries #3) by Victoria Hamilton: A Book Review

Curse of the Gypsy (Lady Anne Addison Mysteries #3) Author: Victoria Hamilton Genre: Historical Fiction, Mystery Publisher: Beyond the Page Release Date: 2019 Pages: 257 Source: Netgalley/Publisher in exchange for an honest review Synopsis : Fans of the Lady Julia Grey Mysteries will love these Georgian historical mysteries.       Finally home in Kent after her recent adventures in Yorkshire and Cornwall, Lady Anne Addison is shocked to spy her erstwhile suitor, the Marquess of Darkefell, skulking around the gypsy camps near her property. Outraged that he has followed her there, she writes a scathing letter to him and his family, which brings Darkefell—and his denials that it was he—to Kent.      Despite Darkefell’s arrival, Anne is preoccupied with the troubles that plague her family and loved ones. Is it the old gypsy woman’s curse that is making her friends ill, or something far more sinister? One by one, Anne and Darkefell must unravel the troubling mysteries, and then travel back