And now Catherine faces the ultimate test: can she keep the Tsar’s death a secret as she plays a lethal game to destroy her enemies and take the crown for herself?įrom the sensuous pleasures of a decadent aristocracy, to the incense-filled rites of the Orthodox Church and the terror of Peter’s torture chambers, the intoxicating and dangerous world of Imperial Russia is brought to vivid life. Peter’s attentions are fickle and his rages powerful his first wife is condemned to a prison cell, her lover impaled alive in Red Square. But even amongst the splendor and opulence of her new life - the lavish feasts, glittering jewels, and candle-lit hours in Peter’s bedchamber - she knows the peril of her position. Into the void steps the woman who has been by his side for decades: his second wife, Catherine Alexeyevna, as ambitious, ruthless, and passionate as Peter himself.īorn into devastating poverty, Catherine used her extraordinary beauty and shrewd intelligence to ingratiate herself with Peter’s powerful generals, finally seducing the Tsar himself. The weakness and treachery of his only son has driven his father to an appalling act of cruelty and left the empire without an heir. Peter the Great lies dying in his magnificent Winter Palace. Ellen Alpsten's rich, sweeping debut novel is the story of her rise to power.

“ recounts this remarkable woman’s colourful life and times.' (Count Nikolai Tolstoy, historian and author)īefore there was Catherine the Great, there was Catherine Alexeyevna: the first woman to rule Russia in her own right.

'Makes Game of Thrones look like a nursery rhyme.' (Daisy Goodwin, New York Times best-selling author of The Fortune Hunter )

The Vatican Princess by C.W. Gortner