The historical stories of the “Tsar’s Servants” series are about great rulers from the perspective of their loyal (and sometimes treacherous) lackeys, maids, cooks, and barbers. The invisible companions of Russian emperors could tell plenty of interesting, scandalous, and touching details about the Romanov dynasty. The stories in the series are based on little-known memoirs and documentary research of the 17th–20th centuries, as well as the personal diaries of the tsars themselves and their close associates. The book consists of twenty-one chapters—the number of rulers from the House of Romanov, including the unofficial ones. Each story includes a brief biographical note about the monarch and his servant.
All characters mentioned in the book really existed. Artistic fiction affected only the form of presenting the material, and the facts listed in the book actually occurred. The narration is in a light, easygoing literary style, yet it reliably conveys the atmosphere of a golden age in Russian history.