Sashenka

Winter, 1916. In St Petersburg, snow is falling in a country on the brink of revolution. Beautiful and headstrong, Sashenka Zeitlin is just sixteen. As her mother parties with Rasputin and her dissolute friends, Sashenka slips into the frozen night to play her role in a dangerous game of conspiracy and seduction.Twenty years on, Sashenka has a powerful husband and two children. Around her people are disappearing but her own family is safe.But she's about to embark on a forbidden love affair which will have devastating consequences. Sashenka's story lies hidden for half a century, until a young historian goes deep into Stalin's private archives and uncovers a heart-breaking story of passion and betrayal, savage cruelty and unexpected heroism - and one woman forced to make an unbearable choice ...

Gripping from start to finish. The perfect mixture of sweeping history and page-turning storytelling, Intensely moving, with an unforgettable climax that will touch the hardest heart, Furiously readable - it's hard to put Sashenka down. The glory and tragedy of her story remains long after the last page is turned, Intricate, fast moving... by the time I put the book down, long after midnight, I was in tears, If you’re fascinated by twentieth-century Russian history, you’ll be intrigued by the tale of Sashenka, a loyal Communist wife married to a powerful party member, whose life starts to unravel when she embarks upon an affair…The author is a noted historian, and this novel is full of fascinating, meticulously researched detail about Russian life.

Simon Sebag Montefiore is the author of the acclaimed novels of his Moscow Trilogy – Sashenka, Red Sky at Noon and One Night in Winter, which won the Paddy Power Political Novel of the Year Prize and was longlisted for the Orwell Prize: the novels are published in 27 languages. Montefiore is also the author of prize-winning bestselling history books now in 48 languages, including Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar, Jerusalem: The Biography and The Romanovs.For more information see: www.simonsebagmontefiore.com or follow him on Twitter: @simonmontefiore.