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The House of Special Purpose
by John Boyne
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London, 1981. Georgy Daniilovich Jachmenev keeps vigil beside his dying wife Zoya and remembers the Russia of his youth. Born into a poor rural family, he is taken to St Petersburg after an act of courage and appointed to the household of Tsarevich Alexei. At court he encounters Nicholas II, Alexandra Feodorovna, the imperial children and Grigori Rasputin while becoming close to Grand Duchess Anastasia.
Revolution destroys the world Georgy has entered. The Romanovs are confined, transferred to Ekaterinburg and murdered in 1918, while Georgy and Zoya’s later life is shaped by exile, war and a secret carried across decades. The novel combines a fictional love story with the decline of the Romanov dynasty, using retrospective narration to explore loyalty, survivor guilt and the reinvention demanded of refugees from revolution.
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