She ran barefoot through a Ryazan village—and became Tsaritsa of All Russia.
She married a Tsar she had seen twice—and bore a son who changed the world.
Her enemies called her "the bast-shoe girl." She called herself mother of Peter the Great.
Moscow, 1669. The Tsaritsa is dead. The Kremlin is a nest of vipers. And in a remote village, thirteen-year-old Natashka Naryshkina laughs with servant girls, carrying mushrooms, knowing nothing of the political storm about to swallow her.
She will stand before the Tsar. She will become stepmother to seven royal children—and sworn enemy to Tsarevna Sofia, clever and merciless.
Then the Tsar dies.
The nightmare begins.
This is not the story of Peter. This is the story of the woman who saved him. The mother who held his hand while the streltsy dragged bloody bodies past the windows. Who fled with him barefoot through the night, racing ahead of assassins. Who lost children, friends, everything—but never lost faith.
Five years of disgrace. Seven years of exile. Death, betrayal, fear—and not one day of doubt.
"I will protect my son. At any cost."
Based on real events, authentic letters, and archival documents. A novel about the woman without whom there would be no Poltava, no fleet, no Petersburg, no Russian Empire.
Because before you raise a great man, you must first keep him alive.
Natalya Naryshkina. Mother of Peter the Great.
The woman who saved her son and gave birth to an empire.
