And of course, I kept writing about the Romanovs. My mom read Robert K. Massie’s Nicholas and Alexandra even before I was born. When I was in college, she bought me a new biography about Rasputin, one that was based on newly released materials from the Russian archives. I read it and was fascinated. I then read a book about the whole of the Romanov dynasty. Then I read another book about the Romanovs, and another… Today I have more than two hundred books about them and I’m always buying more.
I had always wondered what kind of tsar Alexei, Nicholas II’s son, would have been if the revolution hadn’t happened. I also wondered who he would have married and what his children would have been like. I wondered who his sisters would have married, and how their lives would have unfolded. My novel Triumph of a Tsar gave me the opportunity to explore that. I had intended to only write one novel, but it too quickly turned into a series. Triumph of a Tsar goes through World War II, during which Alexei’s cousin, Prince Vsevolod Ioannovich, becomes a spy for Russia and against Nazi Germany. My novel, The Imperial Spy, tells Vsevolod’s story. While writing Triumph of a Tsar, I came across a photo of another of Alexei’s cousins, Prince Konstantin Konstantinovich, third son of the Grand Duke Konstantin, the Romanovs’ famous poet. Prince Konstantin had these light blue eyes that captivated me. Konstantin also never had the chance to marry or have children before the revolution hit. My novel in short stories, Through the Fire, gave me the chance to explore what Konstantin’s life could have looked life if the Romanovs had retained their throne.
My second novel in short stories is Tales of the Romanov Empire, which tells stories about the Romanovs from the beginning of the dynasty in 1613 to the end of the dynasty in 1918. In writing this book, I got to explore the story of Mikhail Romanov, the first Romanov tsar, who was elected to the throne after sixteen years of civil war. I read about the bride shows that were held to help Mikhail and his son, Alexei, find wives. I felt like not enough was known about the fact that Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich, son of Tsar Alexander II, had visited America and hunted buffalos out west with Buffalo Bill. All these stories and more fill the chapters of Tales of the Romanov Empire. So do a few chapters based on my great-grandfather, Wolf Anolic, and his emigration from Romanov territory into New York City.
I plan on writing more books about the Romanovs, and many others besides. Keep watching this space for news about my upcoming work!
I grew up in New York City and began writing short pieces of fiction as early as elementary school. I became more serious about it in high school, but it still took me many years after that to do more than write a novel and never look at it again.
I began writing seriously in college, where I wrote articles for my school’s newspaper. After graduation, I wrote professionally for newspapers like “Newsday” and magazines such as “Financial History Quarterly.” In 2009, my first book was published. "The Russian Riddle," was the first nonfiction biography of the Grand Duke Serge Alexandrovich of Russia, uncle of Nicholas II.
After that I turned to writing fiction. I’ve had several short stories published over the years as I’ve taken the time to write longer works.
Most of my novels have stories behind them. I wrote an early version of The Last Battle in 2002 and 2003, when the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars were first starting. Back then, it was a novella and main character stayed with me. When I decided to write novels more purposefully, with the intention of getting them published, that was the first project I went back to. The wars were still going on even then, and the issue of what obstacles returning vets faced, particularly women vets, resonated with me.
I first got the idea for The Fledgling’s Inferno in 2016, when I was at Reagan National Airport, waiting for a flight. I was in the middle of revising The Last Battle and had gotten ensconced in tales of war and stories of women serving. That made me notice the woman in Army fatigues at the gate, who was on my flight and travelling with her two sisters.
Another young woman was also on the flight. She was traveling with two small children, including a toddler who was very into superheroes. The little boy was wearing a Spiderman shirt, and he had a few Spiderman toys with him. When the flight landed at our destination, everyone got up and started talking. The mother noticed the woman in fatigues and said to her young son, “see, this is a real-life superhero. Can you say, ‘thank you for your service?’”
And that was how Katie McMann, the main character of The Fledgling’s Inferno, was born. After many machinations trying to find the right way to tell this story, I started writing in 2018. The story expanded as I wrote, eventually becoming The Vanguard Warrior Trilogy. The trilogy, which is set at different military academies across the U.S., now includes the books A Silent Evil, set at Valley Forge Military Academy, and The Final Armada, which features cadets at Texas A&M.
Most of my other books have been very different. Growing up, I loved watching figure skating. I was in awe of the skaters’ blend of artistry and athletic ability. I had favorite skaters that I wished had medaled at the Olympics. I wrote the novel Like Water and Ice with that storyline in mind. Thad Moulton is one of the best skaters of his generation, but also one of its inconsistent. I needed to write his story to see if he could hold up under the pressure cooker of the Olympics.
A Brief History
About Me