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Romanov by Nadine Brandes
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Release Date: May 7th 2019

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Retellings

Synopsis:

The history books say I died.

They don’t know the half of it.

Anastasia “Nastya” Romanov was given a single mission: to smuggle an ancient spell into her suitcase on her way to exile in Siberia. It might be her family’s only salvation. But the leader of the Bolshevik army is after them . . . and he’s hunted Romanov before.

Nastya’s only chances of survival are to either release the spell, and deal with the consequences, or enlist help from Zash, the handsome soldier who doesn’t act like the average Bolshevik. Nastya’s never dabbled in magic before, but it doesn’t frighten her as much as her growing attraction for Zash. She likes him. She thinks he might even like her . . .

That is, until she’s on one side of a firing squad . . . and he’s on the other.

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About the Author

Nadine once spent four days as a sea cook in the name of book research. She's the author of FAWKES and of the award-winning The Out of Time Series. Her inner fangirl perks up at the mention of soul-talk, Quidditch, bookstagram, and Oreos. When she's not busy writing novels about bold living, she's adventuring through Middle Earth or taste-testing a new chai. Nadine and her Auror husband are building a Tiny House on wheels. Current mission: paint the world in shalom.

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*I received an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. My thanks to Thomas Nelson*

Anastasia ‘Nastya’ Romanov and her family are royals, but her father abdicated and they are living as captives.

When her family is split up with some of them being sent to face trial, Nastya is charged by her father to conceal and keep safe magic spells which are contraband.

Surrounded by Bolshevik soldiers, can Nastya and her family hold on to their hope?

Can Nastya befriend Zash who doesn’t act like other Bolshevik soldiers?

The mix of historical and magic drew me to Romanov and it was definitely my favourite aspect of the book.

Nastya was a good protagonist. She was likeable and I thought she was very brave given everything she and her family went through.

I liked Nastya’s brother, Alexei, a lot – he didn’t use his haemophilia as an excuse not to put himself in danger and I liked their relationship.

The romance wasn’t one of my favourites that I’ve read, but I didn’t dislike it. I did appreciate that it wasn’t the focus of the novel.

The plot was a bit hit-and-miss for me. Not much really happened for the first half of the book, but then it was pretty much non-stop action (which I enjoyed), so pacing was an issue for me. I really liked that the author used some events that happened from real life and then made them her own by adding magic and spell masters. I found the magic very intriguing – the spell masters used ink for their spells and some had to mature before they could be used.

I liked the writing style, but I wasn’t gripped.

I do feel like Romanov didn’t quite reach its potential and I am disappointed that I didn’t enjoy it more, but overall this was an enjoyable read.

An enjoyable read overall that I would recommend to readers that like twists on historical events.