The Secret Countess by Eva Ibbotson

[Janet]

 

The Secret Countess by Eva Ibbotson

 

The ‘blurb’

ST PETERSBURG, 1917

Anna’s world is under threat. The eighteen-year-old countess has lived in luxury all her life, but revolution is tearing Russia apart - and her family must escape…

 

LONDON, 1919

Now penniless, Anna is working as a servant for the aristocratic Westerholmes. But as she falls in love with the young earl it becomes harder to keep her true identity secret…

 

In 1917 Annoushka is part of the Russian aristocracy, with a happy, lavish lifestyle and a loving family. But Russia is under a time of great change and after the Revolution, Anna and her family flee to London. Her father has been killed and, penniless, Anna and her family move in with her old governess Miss Pinfold.

 

An old friend of the family pays for Anna’s brother Petya to go away to boarding school in Yorkshire, but Anna feels she can’t continue to live off the generosity of ‘Pinny’ forever, and after the offer of a job at a large stately home called Merhsam, Anna sets off to Wiltshire to work as a ‘tweeny’ maid.

 

At first the staff are aloof but Anna’s warmth and lovable nature wins them, and the family for whom she works, over, and she soon settles in. Her main task is to get the house clean for the arrival of the young Earl who has been in hospital since fighting in the Great War, but when Rupert arrives he brings with him his new fiancé and the house is soon preparing for a large, lavish wedding - and Anna finds herself falling in love with the Earl…

 

I enjoyed this book so much! It is aimed at 12 to 15 year olds and is therefore an easy read but it’s such a good story and is so well told. The characters are rounded and believable and Ibbotson captures the feeling of the period so well.

 

Towards the end of the book the action becomes a bit comical and the reader must suspend disbelief, but this is essentially a story of love and I would definitely recommend it.