Emily — Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

Though the granddaughter of an earl, Emily Paget is still a poor relation, living on the good graces and large estate of her aunt and uncle, but determined to earn her own living. This disgraceful ambition moves her aunt to take action: Emily must be married off respectably.

Onto the stage steps her Russian grandmother, who takes her back to Russia to find the freedom and intellectual stimulation she craves. But Emily also falls in love for the first time - with another woman's husband. Drawing room revolutionaries and the dangerous glamour of their politics offer Emily a distraction, but when the brutal 1917 revolution does arrive, she finds herself called upon to rescue the wife and children of the man she loves, without knowing if he is dead or alive

Winner of the Romantic Novel of the Year Award (1993) by the Romantic Novelists' Association.