Critical Praise

"This novel is a rare and rich pleasure, full of exquisite details of the Russian imperial court, of ballet, of diamonds, of intricate love affairs backstage in theaters and palaces in a vanished world."

—Simon Sebag Montefiore, author of Young Stalin and Sashenka

"Mistress of grand dukes and Russia’s last tsar, Mathilde Kschessinska was the fabled prima ballerina assoluta of St. Petersburg’s Maryinsky Ballet during the empire’s last decades. In The True Memoirs of Little K, novelist Adrienne Sharp reveals the passion, greed, and lust for life behind the fairy tale of the ballerina’s real memoirs, and the secret about her son’s paternity that is easy to believe just might be true."

—Lynn Garafola, author of Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes

"I tore through this delectable book like a box of elegantly crafted chocolates. Even now, I keep riffling though the crumpled gold wrappers, wishing there was more. A fascinating, carefully researched, and intricately rendered portrait of the last tsar and his clever, talented, and wildly ambitious mistress, prima ballerina Mathilde Kschessinska. Bravo, Little K."

—Janet Fitch, author of White Oleander and Paint It Black