Enchantments by Kathryn Harrison

This is a wonderful work of historical fiction, set in Russia at the time of the Russian Revolution.  It is 1917.  The Mad Monk, Grigori  Rasputin, who was equal parts feared and reviled, has been killed.  His two daughters, Masha and Varya, become wards of Tsar Nikolay Alexandrovich Romanov and were moved, under imperial guard, to the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoe Seloe, the royal family's private village outside the capital.

This is Masha's story to tell, and she describes life for the Romanovs before the revolution and what follows immediately after Nikolay abdicates.  We know from history what happens next, that Nikolay's brother refuses to take the reigns of power, that the Red Army quickly devolves from an army of communist ideals into just another invading force that rapes and pillages and murders with impunity, and that the Romanovs all perish at their hands.  But this telling is tender and the parts that we know are interwoven with another story that is wonderful to read.

Masha holds a special role in the Romanov household because the czarina hopes that she has the special healing powers that her father possessed to prevent the hemophiliac Alexei from bleeding to death.  She is unable to save Alexei, but she does have a close relationship with him in the book that marks her for life.  The Romanovs come to a brutal end, but Masha does not entirely escape herself.  The book intermingles Alexei's last days with Masha's future life, and the effect is successful.