The Kitchen Boy (2003) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

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Characters edit see section history

• Leonka: The kitchen boy who served the royal family during their house arrest and was abruptly sent away the day before they were executed.
• Misha: Leonka's alias when he moves to America.
• Kate: The narrator Misha's granddaughter.
• Nikolai Aleksandrovich: Russia's last tsar who abdicates the throne, is place under house arrest, and executed alongside his family.
• Aleksandra Fyodorovna: Wife to Nicholas II and last Russian empress.
• Olga Nikolaevna: Nicholas and Alexandra's oldest daughter.
• Tatyana Nikolaevna: Nicholas and Alexandra's second daughter.
• Maria Nikolaevna: Nicholas and Alexandra's third daughter.
• Anastasiya Nikolaevna: Nicholas and Alexandra's fourth daughter.
• Aleksei Nikolaevich: Nicholas and Alexandra's only son, who was a hemophiliac.
• Kharitonov: The cook.
• Demidova: Alexandra's maid.
• Dr. Botkin: The royal family's personal physician.
• Trupp: Nicholas's manservant.
• Sister Antonina: The nun who smuggled secret notes to the royal family when she delivered milk and eggs.
• Yurovsky: Leader of the soldiers who guard the royal family at Ipatiev House, oversees the execution.
• Marina: A novice who helps Sister Antonina.
• Anna Vyrubova: Alexandra's close friend who tried to plan a successful rescue.
• Avdeyev: Leader of the soldiers before Yurovsky
• Volodya: One of the young soldiers who guarded the royal family.
• Rasputin: Controversial monk, friend of the empress, deceased before the story's events
• Dr. Derevenko: Aleksi's physician, not imprisoned with the others
• Father Storozhev: Priest to whom Misha delivers the secret notes
• Itharitonov: Add a description of this character.
• Lenin: Leader of the Russian Revolution

Quotes edit see section history

• “Katya, do you know what is as asinine as kommunizm? Autocracy. One man, one person, cannot rule the hearts and minds of millions. Liberty, freedom, truth -- this America can be such a silly place, so fickle and naive -sometimes so childish! -but it saves irself because of the first three things.”

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• him but by his parliament, he and his family as well as about forty million others were slaughtered.

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• Ironic that the Soviet Union collapsed just as easily, which proves it was no better, that the cure, kommunizm, was in fact far worse than the disease itself.

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• every Russian, in his heart of hearts, believes that sin brings suffering, great suffering. That in turn leads to repentance, and it is that very cleansing which eventually delivers one closer unto the feet of God Himself. Do not forget: sin, repentance, holy deliverance. Sin, torment and cleansing, purification. Sin, suffering, forgiveness.

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• So in the end this is how Nikolai II must be viewed: a very caring man of moderate abilities who, although utterly devoted to his country, was unable to transform the unworkable autocratic system thrust upon him. Period. That simple.

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• Yes, regicide opened the door to fratricide, matricide, and patricide of unimaginable proportion. Some twenty, thirty, forty million souls perished under the Reds,

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• But Lenin knew. Of course he did, for on that day, Tuesday July 16, 1918, he authorized not only the execution of Nikolai, but the entire family, including all the girls and the boy. That was what kind of man he was, a cold-blooded murderer. I spit on the bastard’s body, which to this day lies like a pickle in a glass coffin on Moscow’s Red Square. A shrine to a mass murderer, that’s what it is.

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• Alas, the second suitcase has never been located. It’s supposed to contain one pood—about thirty-six pounds—of diamonds and rubies and emeralds. As far as anyone knows, it’s still buried somewhere in the taiga of Siberia.

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• the realization of how widely hated they were. And by this I mean not by the court, but the narod—the masses—whose emotions were so deeply stirred by the centuries of inequity and darkly spiced by the poisonous propaganda of the Bolsheviki.

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• You know, it’s really so odd they called her nemka, the German. True, she was born a minor German princess, but after her young mother’s death Aleksandra was raised primarily by her “darling Granny,” as she called her beloved grandmother, Queen Victoria. So she was essentially English.

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• Learn to make others happy, think of yourself last of all. Be gentle and kind, never rough nor rude . . . Show a loving heart. Above all, learn to love God with all the force of your soul and He will be near you . . . Your old Mama

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• Russia: Location of the main events
• Moscow: Capital of Russia
• Siberia: Northern region of Russia
• United States: Home of Misha after he fled Russia
• Yekaterinburg: Siberian town where the Romanovs were held

Organizations edit see section history

• KGB: National security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and its premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.

First Sentence edit see section history

Table of Contents edit see section history

Series & Lists edit see section history

Followed by Rasputin's Daughter.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Robert Alexander (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
• Dewey: 813.6

Notes for Parents edit see section history

Some violence and gruesome descriptions of murder

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Literature & Fiction › World Literature › United States › Classics
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Genre Fiction › Historical
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Classics
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Literary
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Classics
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Contemporary

More Books Like This edit see section history