Surgei Galipova, a Russian immigrant and a rancher in the Cariboo region of British Columbia, owes his life to the Countess Catherine Stanislavovna Federov. When the Countess asks Surgei to send his eighteen-year-old daughter, Alice, to help her in a private hospital she is establishing in St. Petersburg, Alice adamantly refuses. But when her father threatens to disown her, she reluctantly agrees to help the Countess for six months. That same summer, in 1914, eleven-year-old Natalya Tcychowski, the youngest daughter of a Hutsul family in the Carpathian Mountains, is coping with a crisis of her own. Having run afoul of the local bailiff, her eighteen-year-old brother, Oleksi, is forced to flee from their home village of Zgardy, which is under the control of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. When he arrives in St. Petersburg, Oleksi seeks the help of the Countess Federov, who owes his father a debt of gratitude for saving her lifetwenty-two years earlier.

The outbreak of war in 1914 puts both Natalya's and Alice's lives on a path they could not have foreseen and cannot avoid. Three years later Alice is still trapped in Russia and her position as a Canadian in Petrograd is becoming increasingly perilous. Natalya's family is torn apart by their loyalty to the Tsar and countess. As Russia is sent into upheaval by the revolutions of 1917, both Natalya and Alice fight for their lives in a country that is rapidly unraveling.

Rosella Leslie was born in Edmonton, Alberta, and grew up in small towns throughout Alberta and British Columbia. She worked in Merritt and Vancouver, before moving in 1980 to a floathouse at Clowhom Falls on Salmon Inlet to focus on her writing career. In 1991, Leslie moved with her husband and son to Sechelt. Leslie’s hobbies include gardening, pulling up crab traps, and early morning mountain walks.

She is also the author of The Sunshine Coast: A Place to Be, and has co-authored Bright Seas, Pioneer Spirits: The Sunshine Coast, and Sea Silver: Inside British Columbia’s Salmon-Farming Industry with Betty Keller. Leslie is also one of the authors of Stain Upon the Sea: West Coast Salmon Fishing, which won The Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize at the 2005 British Columbia Book Awards. Her first solo novel, The Goat Lady's Daughter, was published in the Fall of 2006, and her second novel, Drift Child, was released in September 2010, and her third novel, The Federov Legacy was published in April 2013. In 2014 she published The Cougar Lady: Legendary Trapper of Sechelt Inlet.

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The Federov Legacy

With the aid of careful research, this historical novel tells the remarkable story of the daily terrors faced by Eastern Europeans in the first quarter of the 20th century and reveals the impact that war has on human behaviour. Alice, an 18-year-old Canadian girl, follows her father’s order to join her brother in his homeland Russia, to work as a nurse for Countess Federov. Her planned six-month stay turns into five years in which she faces the horrors of WW1 and the Russian Revolution. Eleven-year-old Natalya, the youngest daughter of a Hutsul family, lives in a small village in the Carpathian Mountains. Natalya copes with trying to save her family, which is being torn apart by their loyality to the czar and the countess. The compelling characters and accuracy of places and events make this a captivating read.

Caution: Contains some coarse language.