What does an auxiliary member of the tsar’s family do as the Bolsheviks reach out to strangle the last vestiges of White Russian society in the aftermath of the 1917 Russian Revolution? As others of the Russian nobility did, young Count Pyotr Romanov, sent by his family in St. Petersburg to the southern Russian city of Kazan to join the cadets of the Imperial Military Academy for safety, escapes from immediate peril to a false safety. Kazan proves not to be far enough, and by 1920 Pyotr, forced to rely on a grasping and controlling academy professor who initiates him in man love, is fleeing first to Novorossiysk, to be evacuated to the Crimea, and then, just as the Bolsheviks are poised to overrun that peninsula into the Black Sea, he is evacuated by sea to Constantinople.
Along the way, and once spit out in Constantinople along with hundreds of other destitute White Russians, Pyotr lives by his wits and his ability to survive by using men who want to use him.
During his struggle to survive he has also pursued the mysterious Katya Betskoya, who harbors a shocking secret and who he has saved from being trampled on the dock at Sevastopol before he is evacuated to Constantinople to live by selling his body on the streets, eventually becoming a chauffeur to an importer. From thence, he finds himself in the Turkish port of Smyrna, where, once again, he is put in physical danger and is caught up in another pogrom, this time pitting Turks against Greeks and Armenians. The illusive Katya appears here, this time in the role of Pyotr’s savior, and he faces yet another need to evacuate to relative safety.
While becoming less and less enchanted by the White Russian cause and more determined to remake himself into a new person and to win Katya, Pyotr gives himself over to the lusts of other men to survive and live against the backdrop of some of the most momentous events to occur in the Black Sea region in the 1920s. This is almost as much a history of the calamitous times as it is of the personal struggle to survive and thrive of a young nobleman in a time of revolution and chaos.
The author has built a poignant and complex story that expertly interweaves history with fiction. Everything about it is excellent, from the characterization to the setting and writing. He's skillful at reviving tragedy, misery, courage, cowardice and hope.. . . This is such a riveting page-turning historical tale! I highly recommend it and give 5 big stars! Black Tulip-Goodreads
The two young men froze as the sound of a voice calling up from the riverfront reached their ears.
“He’s calling me,” Pyotr said, as he used the break in the tension of the moment to permit him to struggle out of Vasily’s grasp and rise up on his knees.
“Your minder calls, yes, and you must go.”
The voice was calling Pyotr’s name—insistently.
“We are at the beck and call of any of the faculty, Vasily. You know that.”
“Yes, but Grigory Orlov is especially attentive to you.”
“My father requested that he be.”
“But I’ll bet your father doesn’t know what Orlov has in mind for you. He wants to take you, Pyotr. Everyone knows that. And everyone knows what Orlov wants from the cadets who attract him.”
“Why is that different from what you want?” Pyotr had stood up and waved at Grigory Orlov, who was standing at the entrance of the academy’s boathouse. Orlov spied Pyotr and beckoned to him. Vasily, who was still sitting on the ground, was outside of Orlov’s range of vision.
“I am young and virile. And titled, as you are,” Vasily answered, his voice edged with bitterness and scorn. “What is Orlov? He is old and is no better than one of our servants. He trained here, but he is not a general. He is only good enough to teach—and to debauch as many of the cadets as he can. He isn’t worthy of you.”
“He’s a faculty member, and he’s seen me. I must answer his call and go down to him.”
“Of course you must. But beware of him. He wants only one thing from you. And you are too good to be deflowered by the likes of him.”
Pyotr could find no answer to that, so he turned and worked his way down the slope to the harbor walk and then to the door to the boathouse. Orlov had already entered the boathouse. He turned in the dim light of the interior, with the reflection of the waves lapping at the side of the academy yacht sending a dancing pattern on the ceiling of the chamber.
“We leave by truck in the morning,” Orlov declared.
“Do you know where we go now?” Pyotr asked.
“Yes, to the Black Sea, to Novorossiysk, to join the army of Admiral Kothak. But do not tell the other cadets. Kothak intends to impress them into service. We need every solider now, no matter how young or ill trained, to enlist in keeping the Bolsheviks from taking our Black Sea ports.”
“It sounds rather hopeless,” Pyotr said.
“It’s never hopeless. We are the ruling class. The communists cannot sustain this for very long. The people will come to the aid of Mother Russia.”
“Soon, I hope.”
“That is not why I sought you out,” Orlov said. He had pulled Pyotr toward him, and turned the young man so that his back was pressed into the side of the yacht that was pulled into the boathouse and that was slowly bobbing in the water next to the boathouse walkway. “We will be traveling for days, and I don’t know how soon we will be able to couple again. I must help supervise the pack out and you will be busy too. Lay on your back on the decking of the vessel. I want to have you again now, while I can.”
Pyotr obediently laid on the deck of the boat and lifted his legs, while Orlov took hold of the waistband of the young man’s sweat pants on either side and pulled them off his legs. The heel of one of Pyotr’s feet pressed into the wet decking of the boathouse walkway and his other leg raised up Orlov’s torso, the young Russian count moaned softly as Orlov’s mouth went to the cock that was still half hard from the recent attentions of Vasily’s fist.
