Born in 1781 in a small impoverished duchy of Germany, Julie’s quiet life took a fairy-tale turn when she married into the Russian Imperial Family – the Romanovs. But this world of baroque splendour, of opulent palaces and grandeur, was no happily ever after. Taken to Russia at just fourteen, her marriage was hastily brokered to save the Saxe-Coburg duchy from financial ruin. Her husband, Grand Duke Konstantin, was cruel and abusive, Julie was uprooted from her home, family, language and culture.

As Russia and Europe were thrown into tumult by the murder of Emperor Paul and the rise of Napoleon, Julie finally made her escape back to Germany, where she lived for two decades as a social pariah, denied a divorce by the Imperial Family. Forced to give up two illegitimate children to protect her family’s honour, she eventually built a life for herself in Switzerland, where she entertained poets and philosophers, regaling them with tales from the Russian court.  

Helen Rappaport recreates the extraordinary life of this forgotten figure. In doing so she sheds new light on the Romanovs, reveals the sacrifices Julie made to further her family’s interests – her brother became king of Belgium, her sister gave birth to Queen Victoria – and investigates the true nature of Julie’s relationship with Tsar Alexander I. Rich in history, drama and royal intrigue, Julie’s remarkable story is told at last.

From the internationally bestselling author of Four Sisters comes the story of the Russian aristocrats, artists, and intellectuals who sought refuge in Belle Époque Paris.

From the time of Peter the Great, Paris was the playground of the tsarist aristocracy. But the fall of the Romanov dynasty in 1917 forced Russians of all types to flee their homeland. Leaving with only the clothes on their backs, many came to France’s glittering capital. Paris was no longer an amusement, but a refuge.

There, former princes could be seen driving taxicabs, while their wives found work in the fashion houses, where their unique Russian style inspired designers such as Coco Chanel. Talented intellectuals, artists, poets, philosophers, and writers eked out a living at menial jobs, while others found great success. Nijinsky, Diaghilev, Bunin, Chagall, and Stravinsky joined Picasso, Hemingway, James Joyce, and Gertrude Stein in the creative crucible of the Années folles.

Politics as much as art absorbed the emigrés. Activists sought to overthrow the Bolshevik regime from afar, while double agents plotted espionage and assassination from both sides. Others became trapped in a cycle of poverty and their all-consuming homesickness for Russia, the land they had been forced to abandon.

This is their story.

Having been raised in Jamaica  and worked in Panama, Mary Seacole came to England in the 1850s and volunteered to help out during the Crimean War. When her services were turned down, she financed her own expedition to Balaclava, where she earned her reputation as a nurse and for her compassion. Popularly known as ‘Mother Seacole’, she was the most famous Black celebrity of her generation – an extraordinary achievement in  Victorian Britain. She regularly mixed with illustrious royal and military patrons and they, along with grateful war veterans, helped her recover financially when she faced bankruptcy. However, after her death in 1881, she was largely forgotten for many years.

More recently, her profile has been revived and her reputation lionised, with a statue of her standing outside St Thomas’s Hospital in London and her portrait – rediscovered by the author – is now on display in the National Portrait Gallery. In Search of Mary Seacole is the fruit of almost twenty years of research by Helen Rappaport into her story. The book reveals the truth about Seacole’s personal life and her ‘rivalry’ with Florence Nightingale, along with much more besides. Often the reality proves to be even more remarkable and dramatic than the legend.

In Four Sisters acclaimed biographer Helen Rappaport offers readers the most authoritative account yet of the Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia. Drawing on their own letters and diaries, she paints a vivid picture of their lives in the dying days of the Romanov dynasty. We see, almost for the first time, their journey from a childhood of enormous privilege, throughout which they led a very sheltered and largely simple life, to young womanhood – their first romantic crushes, their hopes and dreams, the difficulty of coping with a mother who was a chronic invalid and a haemophiliac brother, and, latterly, the trauma of the revolution and its terrible consequences.

Compellingly readable, meticulously researched and deeply moving, Four Sisters gives these young women a voice, and allows their story to resonate for readers almost a century after their death.

‘An astoundingly intimate tale of domestic life lived in the crucible of power’ – Observer