Review: Six Days in Leningrad by Paullina Simons

Six Days in Leningrad - A Memoir by Paullina Simons

Synopsis:

The never-before-told story of the journey behind THE BRONZE HORSEMAN, now in print for the first time.

From the author of the celebrated, internationally bestselling BRONZE HORSEMAN saga comes a glimpse into the private life of its much loved creator, and the real story behind the epic novels. Paullina Simons gives us a work of non-fiction as captivating and heart-wrenching as the lives of Tatiana and Alexander.

Only a few chapters into writing her first story set in Russia, her mother country, Paullina Simons travelled to Leningrad (now St Petersburg) with her beloved Papa. What began as a research trip turned into six days that forever changed her life, the course of her family, and the novel that became THE BRONZE HORSEMAN. After a quarter-century away from her native land, Paullina and her father found a world trapped in yesteryear, with crumbling stucco buildings, entire families living in seven-square-metre communal apartments, and barren fields bombed so badly that nothing would grow there even fifty years later. And yet there were the spectacular white nights, the warm hospitality of family friends and, of course, the pelmeni and caviar.

At times poignant, at times inspiring and funny, this is both a fascinating glimpse into the inspiration behind the epic saga, and a touching story of a family's history, a father and a daughter, and the fate of a nation.

I read The Bronze Horseman back in 2011. I had heard of Simons, but she writes mostly romance novels from what I had noticed, so I didn't get around to trying her. But, then I heard that The Bronze Horseman was a very in-depth look at WWII Leningrad and I was curious. I remember flying through the pages and loving the book. Then I had to get Tatiana & Alexander to see how everything played out. While it is a trilogy, the first two books were really the best because they actually took place during the war and showed the life of two people in a war-torn landscape. I didn't even mind the romance.

Like me and many authors out there, I have not really read much from Simons since that trilogy. But, when I heard that there was a memoir about her experiences revisiting Leningrad in order to research The Bronze Horseman, I knew I had to check it out. When you read a novel and do not know the author, it is easy to miss how their lives can inspire them. Paullina was born in Leningrad in 1963, but her family immigrated to the United States when she was 10. This book captures her return to Leningrad with her father. It was a very interesting read. She found that it put a totally new perspective on things when she looked at Leningrad from the view of an adult when last she had looked on it as a child. As someone that had a very different childhood, it was really quite fascinating to see a place I read about all the time from a different perspective.

I a very glad I got a chance to read this as part of a TLC Book Tour. It is something you definitely should check out if you were a fan of The Bronze Horseman, or if you are just curious about this type of perspective in general. Recommended!

Tatiana & Alexander by Paullina Simons

The world at war … two people in love.Tatiana is eighteen years old and pregnant when she miraculously escapes war-torn Leningrad to the West, believing herself to be a widow. Her husband, Major Alexander Belov, a decorated hero of the Soviet Union, has been arrested by Stalin's infamous secret police and is awaiting imminent death as a traitor and a spy.Tatiana begins her new life in America. In wartime New York City she finds work, friends and a life beyond her dreams. However, her grief is inescapable and she keeps hearing Alexander calling out to her.Meanwhile, Alexander faces the greatest danger he's ever known. An American trapped in Russia since adolescence, he has been serving in the Red Army and posing as a Soviet citizen to protect himself. For him, Russia's war is not over, and both victory and defeat will mean certain death.As the Second World War moves into its spectacular close, Tatiana and Alexander are surrounded by the ghosts of their past and each other. They must struggle against destiny and despair as they find themselves in the fight of their lives. A master of the historical epic, Paullina Simons takes us on a journey across continents, time, and the entire breadth of human emotion, to create a heartrendingly beautiful love story that will live on long after the final page is turned.

It is always good when you host an unofficial reading challenge and actually manage to finish a book yourself! I have challenged myself to read a couple World War I, World War II, etc books this November. This book takes place during the Second World War and just after it, so I think it was a perfect choice.

I have read a lot of books this year, but you know, I haven't been blown away with as many as you would expect. I have only strongly disliked a few books I have read, but I just haven't 'loved to death and want everyone to read NOW' as many books this year as I was expecting. So, when I get really excited about a book, you must understand it is because I am still on the high from a great book AND because I have one more book to add to that very elite list of books you have to read NOW! Namely, this book. I read The Bronze Horseman back in 2007 and started this book right afterwards, but as seems to happen with similar authors (although, not so much this year) I didn't wind up finishing the book at the time. I am determined to decrease the amount of series and trilogies I have on the go, though, so I decided to make this trilogy one of my goals. I AM SO HAPPY THAT I DID!

I have to be frank. I don't like romance novels. I don't like books that are marketed as something else and have extreme levels of romance in them. This is not to say that there are not exceptions to this. This was an exception. In The Bronze Horseman Tatiana and Alexander met, fell in love, and all that came with that during the Second World War in a war-torn Soviet Union. This presented LOTS of obstacles that the couple had to face. Now, some time has gone by and the couple has been married and is expecting their first child. The only problem is (and it is a big problem) Alexander is an American living in Soviet Russia. The Russians think they know this and arrest him, which separates the two lovers. Tatiana is lead to think that Alexander is dead, but since the novel is told from her viewpoint and his, we know he is alive.

I tried to read this slowly. I thought about Marg, who recommended these books to me, and how she read The Bronze Horseman in one night, called in sick for work, bought this book, and then read it in a night. As much as I knew there was a strong possibility I would want to do this, too, I made myself read this book slowly. I limited myself to 50 pages a night. By the end, though, I HAD to know what was going to happen and I ended up reading 200 pages one night to finish it up. I did, when you think about it, limit myself because I started this book two years ago, but that is just so typical me we should ignore that factor! All I will say is that I loved this book! I think everyone who is looking for a good historical fiction novel, a good book set during the Second World War, or even a good romance novel has to read this trilogy!

I still regret that I never reviewed The Bronze Horseman. I loved it, too, though! Tatiana is a great, strong female character who is going through a lot during the war. She is living in New York with her newborn child. She thinks she is a widow, but she is not ready to move on in love. Then, there is Alexander who is still in Soviet Russia. The things that he goes through blow the mind. I loved both characters and thought that Simons wrote them really well! My issue at the moment is book three. I found that this book cleared everything up really well at the end, so I am baffled what there is to talk about in book three. I hope it doesn't take me two more years to find out!

Bottom line: READ THIS BOOK! It will make my best of list for the year. That is a guarantee!

I know I posted today already....

.... but, I have to post and say that I am very much in love with Paullina Simons' writing. Her novels have a good setting, Second World War Russia, but I was worried about the romance element to theml. I will read books with romance in them, but with myself not really being into the majority of the romance world, I was worried that there would be too much. I will say there was about a hundred pages in The Bronze Horseman where I thought there was just a tad too much... but, when you do not read it that much, it is not over-loading. Everyone, I have to say, needs a little romance from time to time. It is all about, for me, the romance being written correctly.

These books are written correctly. I just sat here and read 150 pages out of Tatiana and Alexander, and I am so taken with it, it is hard to not go back to it. Who was it that picked up Gone with the Wind during their December exam week? I am not sure if it is someone that reads my blog, but I remember reading that somewhere in blogland. are like that for me. Tomorrow I will be studying astronomy and taking breaks to see what is happening to them. I could probably go to bed right now and read the ENTIRE book, but... I really shouldn't. I like this one better than The Bronze Horseman, but only by a little. I know, I still owe a review for it, but I will just post them together. The rate I am going, I might be talking about the entire trilogy by the end of the month.

But, I have to say, the TYPOS! There is a page where all the sentences run together. There are no spaces. You have no idea how much that annoys me. It is not all the sentences, but enough that I want a different copy of the book. I know, I'm crazy, but I know worse people than me.

Howdy Everyone!

Sorry I have been mostly MIA, I do owe two reviews, but I have been reading a "chunkster" book and have been rather busy with that. I am reading The Bronze Horseman by Paullina Simons, so I put all my other books away on their shelves, because this is the book that I am concentrating my efforts on. I can see it is the sort of book that when I finish it, I am going to have to read the next one in the trilogy soon after, so I will probably be quiet on the review front. In a perfect world, I would like to finish this book, The Silver Rose by Susan Carroll, and my next J.D. Robb book by Tuesday. Then, I will start Tatiana and Alexander, which, when I just put on my night stand I made the mistake of looking at the back of, so I know what is going to happen, but not how it is going to happen. Book three is out in this trilogy, but it is not available in North America it seems. I only really started to concentrate on this book yesterday, so I have other books almost to completion that I will be able to read next month. If I finish The Bronze Horseman and Tatiana and Alexander by the end of the year, I think that is better than all those thirty books I want to read. The first book has been on my tbr pile for quite some time. The second hand bookstore I bought it at isn't even open anymore.

Me, the unromance reader, strongly recommends this book to those that have not read it already!