The Emperors on Holiday in Finland

[Sarushka]

Императоры На Отдыхе В Финляндии
(The Emperors on Holiday in Finland)
by Iorma & Piaivi Tuomi-Nikula

286 pages
205 photos
Text in Russian

Description from Gilbert's Royal Books:
After becoming part of the Russian Empire in 1809, the Grand Duchy of Finland became one of the favourite summer vacation spots for the Russian Emperors Nicholas I, Alexander II, Alexander III, and Nicholas II. Here they found rest and relaxation from the Russian capital. They and their families cruised the Finnish archipeligo in their yachts, taking time for picnics, fishing and other activities.
Alexander III who was a great lover of nature built his beloved Imperial lodge at Langinkoski.

Nicholas II shared many happy memories cruising amongst the Finnish islands with his family. In 1905, he wrote a letter to his mother stating that "in St. Petersburg I feel constant prey to terrorists, while in Finland I can truly relax". During his reign, Nicholas II spent over 300 days in Finland.

This book offers a very unique selection of rare photographs from State archives and foreign sources. Much of this book and the photographs are devoted to Nicholas II and his family.

I've read on another site that most of these photographs have not been published in Russia. However, I've sent an email to Paul Gilbert asking if the images will also be new to us in the west. (Only one of the three photos on the cover is new to me, so I'm a little hesitant about investing in this book...)

[Sarushka]

Paul's reply:

There are quite a few that are new even to me and I see that the authors have provided photos from private sources in Finland and Russia.

Having said that, however, I am not sure just how many of these photos would actually be considered new to North Americans as some die-hard Romanovphiles have access to a wider selection of books.

[Svetabel]

I bought the book 3 years ago and that time most of the photos had been familiar to me. The edition really has a few rare photos if speaking about images of the Romanovs alone and their group-shots.

The text mostly very dull but anyway informative as the book is the only one good source on the Romanov's vacations in Finnish fiords.

[Sarai_Porretta]

Gilbert's is asking $75 USD for it. However Krisostomus books is asking only 18,16 EUR which is about $26 USD (not including shipping). They are located in Estonia. I ordered an Ella book from them a few months ago and they were very good keeping me updated as to the shipping status and once it shipped it only took less than a week to receive it. Shipping rates were reasonable.
http://www.kriso.ee/cgi-bin/shop/book1500111_o.html

NK books is asking $22 USD for it (not including shipping). Don't have experience with them, but it's another option:
http://www.nkbooks.ru/books.aspx?SearchString=%D0%98%D0%BC%D0%BF%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%82%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%8B%20%D0%BD%D0%B0%20%D0%BE%D1%82%D0%B4%D1%8B%D1%85%D0%B5%20%D0%B2%20%D0%A4%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%BB%D1%8F%D0%BD%D0%B4%D0%B8%D0%B8&btype=1&lang=cyr

[Sarushka]

Panrus.com also carries it for $25, although they're currently out of stock. Another shipment is expected in a couple weeks.

For those of you who'd like to hunt for other sources, the ISBN is 5901841158.

[Alejandro Spain]

Do you know if this book is available in English?

Regards!

[Sarushka]

No, it's not. It was originally written in Finnish, and to my knowledge has only been translated into Russian so far.

[Hilla]

I read this book myself a few years ago in Finnish and I must agree with Svetabel about the fact that the text itself is quite boring and tiring to read and not so many pictures were actually new for me either.

But, if you are interested in the subject and can understand Russian or Finnish, then the book is very informative and has a lot of information about their holidays that I myself for example didn't know. It's a good view of the normal life the imperial family had when they had a chance to on a holiday.