A Book Review: Tsarina by Ellen Alpsten - MINOR SPOILERS

Overall Rating: ⭐⭐⭐/5

Would I recommend this book: It depends on what you're into but I personally wouldn't recommend it.

Overall, I think Tsarina was an okay book. It’s set in 18th Century Russia and follows the life of Catherine the First (previously called Marta) and is not to be confused with Catherine the Great. Whilst I did think the book was decent there are quite a couple of issues I had with the book, both writing and plot. The first half was a 4/5 for me and the second half was a 3 ish/5.

Firstly, and most importantly, I feel as though the book had little concept of time and all the events almost blurred into one another. The novel switches between Catherine’s life before Peter the Great has passed and the events that occur right after his passing. When dates were mentioned, it’d be in reference to wars or that it was 1725 (when Peter died), and they’d be almost irrelevant to me because I couldn’t quite work out how old she or Peter was when things were happening.

Secondly, things got a little repetitive, especially in the second half of the book with Catherine’s pregnancies. Catherine got pregnant 13 times and the book went through every single one and I feel like it dragged at times. Combined with me not knowing the timings of things it just seemed like she was getting pregnant again and again (which she was) and it caused me to lose a little interest.

Also, I know this was probably very common at the time, but everyone was just having affairs. Peter himself had 5 named mistresses (Marta included) and there’s more implied infidelity during his marriage to Catherine too. Personally, this isn’t my cup of tea, it just got a little boring.

I saw someone say that the whole book was a trigger warning before reading and now that I’ve finished, I’m inclined to agree. There’s a lot of r**e in the book and it’s mentioned in a bit of detail. So, if you don’t feel comfortable reading that please avoid this book!

Tsarina feels like a fully blown biography with everything being mentioned in quite some detail. But I did really enjoy reading about Marta before she became Catherine. I think that’s what redeemed the book, to be honest. All in all, it highlights the debauchery and depravity that was the Russian court during Peter the Great's reign very well.

Thank you all for reading,

Peace and love,

Aziza (I'm too tired to think of a sign off today)