Adrienne Sharp

First Line: My name is Mathilde Kschessinska, and I was the greatest Russian ballerina on the imperial stages.

In 1971, a tiny, 100-year-old woman sits down to write her memoirs of everything she knows to be true. She is Mathilde Kschessinska, once the greatest ballerina on the Russian imperial stage. Born to Polish parents, when the extremely competitive Kschessinska was enrolled in ballet school, she set high goals for herself. She became the best ballerina; she became the lover of show more tsarevich Nicholas Romanov; she became wealthy beyond her dreams. In the end, she lost everything but her memories.

I had a difficult time reading this book for two reasons. The first is a technicality: not everyone can sit down and read undisturbed for a lengthy period of time. I've learned to look for paragraph breaks as natural stopping points. This book is 384 pages of very, very long paragraphs, and I was surprised to find that one little thing was tiring. It may sound picky, but it's a detail that I noticed over and over again.

The second reason why this book could be difficult to read can be found in the character of Kschessinska herself. Throughout the book, she is unapologetically opportunistic. She thinks nothing of using slander and sabotage (among other things) to get what she wants. I found that, after a few pages of her machinations, I wanted to stop and do something else. However, her unflinching honesty was refreshing. She may have enough pride for three people, and she may not be sorry for anything she's done, but at least she tells the truth.

" I hear that visitors to my mansion, now the State Museum of Political History, to this day ask to see the entrance to the secret tunnel that once linked the palace of the dancer Kschessinska to the palace of the tsar. Political history does not interest them. I interest them."

The one thing about Sharp's book that held me spellbound was her depiction of a vanished world. Tsarist Russia may have been filled with decadence and cruelty, but it was also filled with incredible beauty-- a land of vast contradictions as so many countries are.

I enjoyed Sharp's skill in weaving her believable fictional tale around historical figures I've read so much about. She also provided more background into the history of ballet and helped me put several dancers in their proper context.

If you love novels set in the Russia of Nicholas and Alexandra, you should love this book-- as long as your heroines don't have to be scrupulously honest in their morals and behavior. show less

The danger with historical fiction is that an author can take history and literally make it fantasy if not careful. This is not the case with Adrienne Sharp's The True Memoirs of Little K. One quick Internet search showcases how much of Ms. Sharp's tale dovetails nicely with the facts. This heightens the element of plausibility in these "True Memoirs", adding to the reader's overall enjoyment and fascination with the last years of the Czar.

Kschessinska is quite the character. She is selfish, show more egoistic, arrogant, and extremely self-centered. She is a true prima donna. However, she is extremely honest, and therein lies her charms and validity as a narrator. Instead of hiding behind her righteousness, Kschessinska tells her story, faults and all, without apologizing or defending her actions or opinions. Her actions and opinions are downright infuriating at times, and yet she is still sympathetic. As a result, there is an implicit trust and intimacy between the reader and Kschessinska that emphasizes the turmoil of Czarist Russia around the turn of the century and beyond while highlighting the difficulties one faced in remaining neutral, let alone staying alive, during the various revolts.

The downfall of the Romanovs is a well-known story, but The True Memoirs of Little K brings new life to this infamous tale. The reader sees the pressures faced by Czar Nicholas from the fringes of the elite. Of even more interest is the idea that had Kschessinska not made certain choices - to become the czar's mistress, to align herself so publicly with the Romanov family - she may not have been in such immediate danger. That being said, Ms. Sharp excels at showing the reader just how pervasive the danger to anyone not supporting the Soviets truly was. There is no glossing over a glorious revolution or pretending the situation is more than it was. In the spirit of her total honesty, Kschessinska does not mince words when it comes to the brutality of the Soviets or the conflicting sympathies of the people. The reader leaves The True Memoirs of Little K with a clear understanding that the revolutionaries took full advantage of a terrible situation, namely the huge shortages and famines that occurred during World War, to achieve their goals even though a majority of the Russian people ultimately did not want what the Soviets were offering. It is a tragedy of epic proportions.

Adrienne Sharp's re-envisioning of the fall of Czarist Russia is extremely well-researched and well-written. There are enough historical facts to lend credence to Kschessinska's tales of Nicholas and Alexandra. While she may not be the most likable of characters, the reader does not doubt her story and even begins to question the history books on what are the true facts behind Nicholas' dalliance with his mistress. The world has been fascinated with the Romanov family since their tragic demise. The True Memoirs of Little K helps explain and perpetuate that fascination.

Acknowledgements: Thank you to Nicole Bonia of Linus's Blanket and Picador Books for my review copy. show less

Mathilde Kschessinska is seventeen and just graduating from the Russian Imperial Ballet in St. Petersburg during the reign of Tsar Nicholas I. She comes from a long line of performers and is expected to culminate her career as a prima ballerina on the Russian stage. But Little K, as she comes to be known, has other plans, for she is interested in snagging the affections and protection of tsarevitch Niki, the young man who will one day become Tsar Nicholas II. During this period in history, show more the ballet ostensibly existed for the pleasure of the royal family, and each ballerina strove to snare a young and handsome protector from one of the royal houses or the upper echelons of the military. But for Little K, only tsarevitch Niki would do. After a brief flirtation, the tsarevitch succumbs to Little K’s wiles and a life-long relationship begins. As their courtship is cemented, Niki uses his sizable influence to secure the best roles and opportunities for Little K. Though this relationship is initially fraught with passion and vigor, soon Niki decides to make the princess Alix his wife, much to Little K’s anger and chagrin. Soon Little K must search for another protector and benefactor while still holding on to her dreams of luring Nicholas back to her bed. But the Russia of this time was not a stable place, and before long Nicholas I has succumbed to illness, leaving the young Niki the tsar of the land. After his betrothal and marriage to Alix, Little K is left in the wings, seemingly forever. But soon the Russian revolution begins and the tsar and his family are in danger from both the common folk and the nobility. Little K soon finds herself in the middle of a conspiracy of giant proportions and back in Niki’s good graces as well. As Russia begins to self-destruct and its leaders are torn from their illustrious positions, Little K must decide how far she will go for love and whom she will protect when her world comes crumbling down around her. In a subtle blend of history and fiction, The True Memoirs of Little K takes its readers into the heart and mind of one very ambitious ballerina and shines a spotlight on the Russia of the past.

I had a lot of mixed feelings while I was reading this book, and I’ll tell you why. First off, I love Russian history and feel like there’s a lot that I don’t know about this particular time, though I am quite familiar with the story of Nicholas, Alexandra, and Rasputin. I also love books that are structured in the style of a memoir but are actually fictional works. The history in this book was clear and cogent, and I learned a lot about the inner machinations of 19th century Russia, which was a real boon for me. What I don’t love is when a protagonist is so egotistical and arrogant that it annoys and irritates, which was the case for Little K herself. It was only towards the end of the book that she showed any humility, and in my opinion, even that bit was marred by her subtle egotism. I grew tired of Little K’s antics and her bragging, which seemed to encompass every area and topic, and while I liked the history of the story, I was much less enamoured of its protagonist.

At the heart of things this book is basically a triple layered story about love, ambition and history, and while it excels in some areas, others are not as magnanimously wrought. What I did enjoy was that Sharp was not afraid to go full throttle with the history, explaining the various coups and their players without dumbing them down for her audience. She had a knack for making the dusty annals of history come alive through her narrative and for focusing tightly on the drama and corruption of that time. Having known only a little bit about what was going on in that time and place, I felt that the knowledge that I gained was substantial and it really grounded me in the atmosphere of 19th century Russia. While reading, I got to see things from every vantage point, which made for a really rich reading experience. Reading about the opulence of the Russian court in its heyday all the way through to its final gasps was enlightening to say the least, and gave me a fresh perspective on things I’ve long heard about but never delved deeply into.

The second piece of this tapestry was the focus on the ambitions of Little K. Though tsarevitch Niki was her first and foremost concern, her career as a ballerina was also pretty important to her. This was where I started getting annoyed with her, for she was just so overwhelmingly narcissistic about what a wonderful dancer she was and how she was leagues beyond her counterparts when it came to her performance style. As Little K’s relationship with the tsarevitch begins to heat up, she’s granted special compensation and undeserved roles in the ballet due to her standing as a royal favorite. I think even Little K herself knew that she never would have gotten as far as she did on her own merits, and that wasn’t where the problem lay with me. The problem was her incessant bragging and her hostility and tantrums when she didn’t get her way to the letter. She was also ruthless about attacking the other ballerinas’ looks and skill, and for me, it got old very quickly. Whenever Little K opened her mouth to pat herself on the back, I just rolled my eyes and sucked my teeth.

The love story in this book was not exactly what you would call one of romance and like-mindedness. Rather, it was punctuated by obsession and jealously, mostly from Little K. It was clear that she would never be able to marry the tsar, being that she was only a dancer, but Little K held on to that little nugget of hope that one day he would be hers. She went to some great lengths to seduce him and anger his wife, Alix, and while he almost always indulged her, it was clear that he was also wary of her at times. I didn’t see a lot of reciprocity when it came to the love between the tsar and Little K, but in her eyes, this was unimportant. Though it’s not the type of love that I would want, in the end, both parties stood by each other and tried very hard to save each other, which may indeed point to a greater love and respect than I had thought possible in this union.

Though I had some niggles with the main character’s behavior and antics, I did really enjoy the book’s deep historical leanings, and I ended up learning a lot. There were a lot of ballet and dancing terms scattered throughout, and since I’m not a dancer, I was happy to let my eyes glide over those bits with no detriment to my reading experience. If you’re the type of reader who can’t stand smug and self-centered characters, this is probably not the book for you. But if you want a very elaborate and detailed account of 19th century Russia and its last tsar, you would be doing a great thing by picking up this book. show less

This turned out to be a better novel than I feared in the first 100 pages or so. True, the author makes her real-life narrator, ballerine Mathilde Kschessinska, a rather unsympathetic character: 'Mala' is selfish, self-absorbed, able to juggle romantic dalliances with several Romanov grand dukes simultaneously and unable to see beneath the glittering surface to the ugliness beneath. She's so caught up in her envy of Empress Alexandra (she had been Tsar Nicholas's mistress before his show more marriage) that she can't see beyond that; similarly, she has such absolute self-confidence as to dismiss anyone who can't appreciate her greatness as silly.

As the novel progressed, I never got to like Mala or feel that she was "real" as a character, but I did get swept up in the broader narrative, especially as the tsar's plans for her son become evident to Mala and I ended up racing through the last 100 pages or so to see how Sharp resolved her creative license. While I didn't always enjoy the fact that Mala, as narrator, takes an omniscient view, looking back over her life at age 99 and interrupting her reminiscences with commentary, I found it grew on me and became less jarring as time passed. Cautiously recommended; you'll enjoy it more if you like historical fiction and have a basic familiarity with the time & place. 3.4 stars show less