Readers' hackles may be raised on seeing the cover of this book bearing the words: 'The astonishing story of the survival of the Tsarevich. Written by his son.' Mine were.
This reviewer never doubted that in July 1918, the Romanov dynasty of Russia came to an abrupt and bloody end when the Tsar, Tsarina and their children were executed by a firing squad, in Ekaterinburg, in the Urals.
Now, here was a former college principal from Northern Ireland, claiming that Nicholas II's only son, the Tsarevich Alexei, had cheated death, been spirited across borders and into hiding, and had emerged some years later as Nikolai Chebotarev - who had then fathered a son, Michael Gray.
So, I was ready to treat the book with contempt. However, I enjoyed reading it and many of Gray's arguments, while inconclusive, are persuasive.
Gray's search for the truth began in April 1993, when the curator of the local museum in his Ulster town suggested that Gray's son bore a remarkable resemblance to Alexei. Gray recalled reading press reports the year before when the supposed bones of the Romanovs had been dug up in Ekaterinburg, that two skeletons were missing - that of Alexei and that of one of his sisters. This launched Gray on a five-year hunt across Europe, as he scoured whatever he could find in archives and old newspapers, and tracked down the dwindling remnants of the emigre White Russian community. He had little time; during the course of his research many of those who might know the truth died.
Gray believes he was hampered by a conspiracy of silence led by the British royal family: a conspiracy, he claims, that resulted in him being fired from his college and having his professional reputation ruined.