This surely fictional account of Alexei's survival (which I believe has been basically debunked by the remains of Alexei finally located in 2007) by another of the Romanov 'pretenders' - Does contain interesting and valid historical documents and accounts, as well as extremely interesting maps and diagrams E.G. layout of the bone remains found under the Koptyaki road outside of Ekaterinburg (Sverdlovsk) from that 1991 grave discovery. ( )

I enjoyed this but reader beware: the subtitle of the book is much more appropriate than the title. While I definitely appreciate that the authors didn't launch into a history of Russian politics but, instead, got straight to the facts and the mystery surrounding the night of the murders, it was a *bit* frustrating that Filatov wasn't discussed for the first 100 pages! This would have been much less frustrating had it not been such a scientific analysis. Information was repeated, verbatim sometimes, in order to show evidence for the authors' conclusions, but it made for an irritating read in parts. I think this is just due to cultural style---as is the other irritating bit about the very detailed description of "Alexei's" escape in the APPENDIX (page 199) being mentioned no where else in the book. After reading this, I am sympathetic to Filatov and can see a very good case for him being the actual Alexei. I do think that it's important to understand the information on the first 100 pages, though, in order to reach this conclusion.

The latest research dates in the book are about 1997, and some information was yet to be verified. Now that I've read this far, I'm interested in doing a little online research to see what has turned up since. ( )

This is the account of what could have been an alternative ending in the killings of the Romonov family in Russia in 1918. With lots of supporting documents and pictures it makes the case for Alexei, the youngest child of Tsar Nicholas II to have survived the shootings of his family and to have changed his name to Vasily Filatov. While none of us will even know what really happened that night, there is a great resemblance between members of Vasily family and the Imperial family and some unexplained facts.

What do you think? I believe it is an interesting suggestion-but who knows. Still it was a thought provoking read ( )