Rating: 
Summary: Titilating Tale...
Review: ...but worthless as a historical biography. This book is a collection of the most salacious gossip from the latter days of the Romanov Empire. It is both entertaining and gives some insight to the "mood" of St. Petersburg at that time, but is filled with "inaccuracies", from references to Rasputin's youth as a time of living in primitive poverty to refering to him as a monk to descriptions of a life style of unrestrained, wild debauchery. In fact, his father was a land owner, Rasputin grew up in a nice home in a town that benefited from being located by rivers (making commerce an important part of the town), was never a monk, remained married to the same woman, brought his two daughters to live with him in St. Petersburg so they could have an education, and for a complex set of reasons, allowed himself to be a scapegoat. While he admitted to "falling into sin", those incidents were a very small part of a very complex and interesting person/life.
Rating:
Summary: Titilating Tale...
Review: ...but worthless as a historical biography. This book is a collection of the most salacious gossip from the latter days of the Romanov Empire. It is both entertaining and gives some insight to the "mood" of St. Petersburg at that time, but is filled with "inaccuracies", from references to Rasputin's youth as a time of living in primitive poverty to refering to him as a monk to descriptions of a life style of unrestrained, wild debauchery. In fact, his father was a land owner, Rasputin grew up in a nice home in a town that benefited from being located by rivers (making commerce an important part of the town), was never a monk, remained married to the same woman, brought his two daughters to live with him in St. Petersburg so they could have an education, and for a complex set of reasons, allowed himself to be a scapegoat. While he admitted to "falling into sin", those incidents were a very small part of a very complex and interesting person/life.
Rating:
Summary: Titilating Tale...
Review: ...but worthless as a historical biography. This book is a collection of the most salacious gossip from the latter days of the Romanov Empire. It is both entertaining and gives some insight to the "mood" of St. Petersburg at that time, but is filled with "inaccuracies", from references to Rasputin's youth as a time of living in primitive poverty to refering to him as a monk to descriptions of a life style of unrestrained, wild debauchery. In fact, his father was a land owner, Rasputin grew up in a nice home in a town that benefited from being located by rivers (making commerce an important part of the town), was never a monk, remained married to the same woman, brought his two daughters to live with him in St. Petersburg so they could have an education, and for a complex set of reasons, allowed himself to be a scapegoat. While he admitted to "falling into sin", those incidents were a very small part of a very complex and interesting person/life.
Rating: 
Summary: Rasputin and the fall of the House of Romanov
Review: A beautifully written book, the characters in this vivid drama of tsarist Russia under Nicholas II and Alexandra come alive and are fleshed out. Rasputin, in spite of his lechery, drunkeness,and exhibtionism was charming with children, including the hemophiliac tsarevitch Alexis (usually called Alexei) For the first time ever, I felt a twinge of pity for Rasputin. The tsar and tsarina come to life too. Though decent in private, in his public affairs Nicholas was deceitful, vascillating, and jealous and Alexandra was a virago who wore the pants in the family, meddled in public affairs and lead her husband around by an invisible ring in his nose. Together they progressed from one dreadful mistake to the next. They governed Russia with stupidity, isolated as they were from the Russian people.They were almost surreal, tucked away in their sweltering cocoon.This book is superb. It is a page-turner. You will become so immersed in the lives of the Russian people at the turn of the last century that you'll forget where you are. And you will discover that Rasputin, dispite his monstrous faults, is very human.
Rating: 
Summary: Moynahan's time and effort in research pays off nicely
Review: A shocking tell-all it ain't. But if you're in search of a thorough, complete, and well-written account of Grigory Rasputin, search no further. Moynahan scours the history books, eyewitnesses, records, and sources from all over the pre-Bolshevik times of Russia and the result is an entertaining yet historically-accurate piece.
Rating:
Summary: fun read
Review: Although it has its errors, this is an engrossing biography about Rasputin. Full of new information and little-known facts, it's not afraid to shy away from the nitty-gritty, it's not afraid to give us the dirt on this guy, without all the false romanticism about Rasputin being so saintly and such. But this is an honest portrait of Rasputin, giving him credit where credit is due. I like this gritty lurid style of writing, which doesn't downplay or leave out the salacious sensationalistic stuff. There is no doubt that you will be convinced of Rasputin's iron hold on the Russian royal family due to his supposed supernatural powers, which included healing the Tzar's hemophiliac son and heir to the throne, Alexei. But, alas, there would never be a new Tzar, as through his scandalous public and priavte life Rasputin unwittingly contributed to the Romanov dynasty's fall. I recommend this book especially to people who enjoy reading a good bio about unusual personalities from the past. David Rehak
author of "Love and Madness"
Rating: 
Summary: Rasputin
Review: Although this book provided much insight onto the early life and background of Gregory Rasputin, I found it to be generally lacking in historial facts. I felt that Moynahan treated Nicholas and Alexandra with an unfair disdain, and lacked the appropriate documentation to make his arguments stick in this area.
Rating:
Summary: What disagreeable traits?
Review: First of all, I'd like to know what was so bad about Rasputin's habits? According to his own philosophy, he did nothing wrong, and alot of good. If you're going to judge him by orthodox christianity's standards, I'm sure he would be the first to tell you to go toss off. Okay okay, the fall of the Russian Empire. Like I'm sure he did that on purpose. But if you judge him by human standards, I'm sure you'll find that you're just jealous. So having said that, I'll go on to say that 'The Saint Who Sinned' was a pretty good read. But if you're really interested in the subject, I'd go back and read the books that were published at the time, i.e. 'The Holy Devil' and that hysterically childish one written by Yusupov, and perhaps some of the things written by Marie Rasputin, his daughter. The thing to keep in mind when reading about Rasputin is the fact that anybody who cares enough to actually write a book about him is going to be biased one way or the other, and whether they mean to or not, some of that is going to show in the work. So you've got to always always read between the opinions and don't take whether or not it's sensationalism so seriously. Rasputin never gave a damn what was said about him, and I wouldn't presume to.
Rating:
Summary: Russia Made Flesh and Bone
Review: Grigorii Rasputin has entered the symbology of Western civilization as shorthand example of the unreasoning nature of religion and the excesses that arise from religious fanaticism coupled with hypocrisy. Say "Rasputin" and you conjure up an icon-wielding hustler who managed to take a whole empire down with him. But Rasputin himself -- and the impact he had on Russia -- was far more complex than popular memory either remembers or can understand. Probably more than anyone else, Grigorii Yefimovich Rasputin was a living metaphor for the Russia of his era. Brian Moynahan does a good job of exposing the contradictions at the root of Rasputin's life -- the Siberian peasant who embraced Russian Orthodoxy, but could not resist the lure of the secular city; the impoverished starets who could not contain his overwhelming lust for wine, women and influence; the powerful physical presence coupled with an almost incoherent world view that was, at best, shallow and mawkish; the born grafter and village ne'er-do-well who made little personal gain out of his machinations, yet managed to undermine the tsarist regime entirely by placing incompetent thieves at its highest levels; the staunch monarchist whose powerful skills of persuasion, observation and analysis were never able to grasp the need to democratize the tsarist system in order to preserve it. Rasputin, during much of his adult life, was a tangled ball of conflicts and motives. Those same conflicts mirrored those present in Russian society and culture at the time. While certainly not white-washing Rasputin's many high crimes and misdemeanors, Moynahan's treatise renders the starets as a somewhat pitiable character. Ultimately consumed by his basest desires, Grigorii Yefimovich squandered the opportunity his influence over the Romanovs provided him to rise to greatness in the eyes of his countrymen and history. A less dissolute and corrupt Rasputin might have been able to move the tsar away from the slow drift to war with Germany and Austria-Hungary and wean the tsarina from her disastrous fixation on absolute autocracy at all costs. Moynahan's book doesn't deserve the severe condemnation heaped on it in the New York Times review. It does have its limitations, particularly the awkward English renditions of the original Russian quotes of many of the participants in Rasputin's story. The starets' murder almost certainly included the active participation of the Okhrana and courtiers close to Nicholas II, yet Moynahan breaks no new ground in revealing who those people were and how they fit into the conspiracy. Brian Moynahan tells Rasputin's story with flair and compassion. In doing so, he reveals a nation torn between the best and worst of human behavior and inclination. Russia was no better than Rasputin and vice versus. And in that moral equivalence lay the destruction of an empire and the genocide of several generations that followed the October Revolution.
Rating:
Summary: Rasputin: Victim of Jealousy & Bloody Conspirators
Review: Hi...Mr Brian; You wrote the book about my favourite hero Mr Rasputin, the kinda book I've longing for. Two thumbs up for you. Your book give justice for Mr Rasputin although some of the paragraph needs alteration (by me Mr Brian, I'm just kidding!) cos' I just like people known Mr Rasputin as a high respectively human being. His personal matters with Tsarina & other wrong doing is the other side of the mirror but his good doing for the people count, of cos' covered the negative part of him. Anyway I give you 150 out of 100.
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