Fascinating study. Not a period or country I'd read a lot about but Grey's account (whilst heavy on the scene setting) does a good job of bringing it to life, even though it's obvious that the source material is sketchy - but at least he acknowledges that! ( )

This is a colourful narrative of the life of the real historical Russian Tsar Boris Godunov, only generally known from Pushkin's play and Mussorgsky's opera of the same names. Boris rose to power under the notorious Ivan the Terrible, whose younger son by his first wife, Fedor, married Boris's sister Irina. When Fedor succeeded his father in 1584, Boris was the power behind the throne, and when Fedor died without an heir in 1598, Boris was the obvious candidate for ruler. His rule was short lived and ended in famine and a revolt of a pretender who claimed to be Dimitri, a younger son of Ivan the Terrible. By the violent standards of the era, Boris was a relatively liberal and enlightened ruler and comes across as an interesting figure at a crucial period of Russian history. Since not that much is known about him, this book, despite being under 200 pages, only partially focuses on Boris. ( )