The Firebird is Another Winner from Susanna Kearsley

THE FIREBIRD
Susanna Kearsley
Sourcebooks
June 2013

Susanna Kearsley is one of my favorite authors. I have read almost all her books and while I like some more than others I have never been disappointed. In The Firebird she brings back two favorite characters; a grown-up Robbie MacMorran from The Shadowy Horses and Anna Moray, daughter of John and Sophia Moray from The Winter Sea.

Nicola Marter works for an art dealer in London and has an unusual psychic gift. She can touch an object and see visions about it's origins. She is very uncomfortable about her gift as she was raised by her Russian grandfather who also has the gift and suffered torture in the former Soviet regime. Naturally he cautions Nicola to keep her gift a secret. The only time she ever deviated was by participating in a parapsychology study while doing graduate work in Edinburgh. It was during the study that she met the extraordinarily gifted "seer" Robbie. Nicola breaks with the study and Robbie two years before The Firebird begins. A woman comes to the gallery with a small wooden statue of a firebird; one that she says belonged to the Empress Catherine I of Russia and was given to an ancestor named Anna.  When Nicola handles the statue she knows this is true but has no way of proving it without exposing her gift and being considered a freak. She is touched however by the woman, who is desperate to sell for her own reasons and calls on Robbie for help. Robbie has the ability to see into both the past and the future and can include Nicola in his visions when she is in physical contact with him.

The story takes us from present day St. Petersburg to the St. Petersburg of Peter the Great in the early 18th century. Robbie and Nicola follow Anna though St. Petersburg, where she is now the ward of a Vice-Admiral in the Tsar's service. Russia has a highly placed group of Jacobite ex-pats, of whom Anna is an active member. She, like the others is a loyal advocate for "the king across the water" and plots are afoot to get Russia more actively involved in the Jacobite cause. Susanna Kearsley's research allows her to blend the stories of both actual historical figures and fictional ones into a seamless whole. I particularly enjoyed the glimpses of St. Petersburg since I have visited the city twice and could clearly visualize many of the places Rob and Nicola visit.

The Firebird is a lush, romantic read; one that is very hard to put down. It has to be one of Susanna Kearsley's best novels. The only reason that I don't give it a full five star rating is that it didn't quite pack the same emotional wallop as The Winter Sea, at least not for me. It does however bring that story full circle in a very satisfactory manner. I highly recommend it to any lover of historical fiction. 

RATING- 4.5 Stars