Ratings

Content Ratings based on a 0-5 scale where
0 = no objectionable content and
5 = an excessive or disturbing level of content

Guide to Rating System

LANGUAGE

VIOLENCE

SEXUAL CONTENT

ADULT THEMES

Ratings Explanation

Violence:  Mentions of assassinations, beatings of peasants and animals, wounded soldiers, amputations, suicide,  and murder.

Sexual Content:  Rasputin tries to take advantage of a palace maid but is caught by the princess and her friend.

Adult Themes:  The setting of the story takes place during the revolution of Russia.  This brings with it many difficult issues such as war, death of loved ones, suffering of the poor, and murder and suicide because of the stress.

Synopsis

Fourteen-year-old Katya Ivanova lives in St. Petersburg, Russia shortly before the country’s revolution.  She is the daughter of the Empress’s lady-in-waiting and a special friend to the royal family’s youngest daughter, Anastasia.   Katya’s father and uncle were both killed in the last Russian war.  Her uncle’s son Misha is now under her mother’s care.  He is a young teenager, lured by local college students’ opinions of how poorly the government is being run.  Misha occasionally sneaks Katya out with him to see what life is really like outside of the royal palace.  He shows Katya a sweat shop employing children and women being beaten trying to get food for their families.  Katya returns horrified and determined tell the Tsar.  The royal family has become her family and she knows the Tsar would never allow such awful things to happen to his beloved people.  Before her confession, war breaks out with Germany.  Katya tells her mother instead, hoping she will have some influence with the Empress.  Her mother panics, knowing that Misha’s political opinions will not be popular and quickly enlists him in the army.  The war is long and takes a heavy toll on the Russian people.  Revolutionists begin to rise up and take control. Bitter peasants want to overthrow the Tsar.  The royal family is exiled to Siberia, and Katya and her mother go with them.  They are imprisoned in a home there where they have no contact with the outside world.  As the revolution progresses, funds are cut off from the Tsar and the royal family is taken back to St. Petersburg to face their new leaders.  Katya and her mother return to their estate only to find it burned to the ground.  They decide to stay, and with the help of some old servants, fix up a small hut to live in.  Misha returns from the war and finds them there.  He asks Katya to join him  and return to the city to help their country find peace and democracy.

I was touched by Katya’s story.  It was interesting to see the Revolution from an aristocratic point of view.  How true to life the story was I don’t know, but it was disheartening to see the royal family who loved and cared for each other and did want their country to be great, destroy their country because they were so far removed from their people and their day to day struggles.