It certainly is epic and requires a certain fortitude to get through. Look I get it this series is long, beautiful, and ugly. I call it the details of life, or you know the little and big things that make us who we are. Tatiana and Alexander's story is full of what other's have called 'mundane details'. The story and writing is full of actions -heroic, cowardliness, moral, immoral, right, wrong, gray. The story and writing is full of emotion -love, hate, jealousy, sadness, anger, joy. I can't even and doubt I will ever be able to articulate how this series ravaged me. Can they be happy? Or will the ghosts of yesterday reach out to blight even the destiny of their firstborn son?Įpic in scope, masterfully told, The Summer Garden is a novel of unique and devastating emotional power that spans two thirds of the twentieth century, and three continents. In the climate of fear and mistrust of the Cold War, dark forces are at work in the US that threaten their life and their family. But though they are only in their twenties, in their hearts they are old, and they are strangers. They have proved to each other that their love is greater than the vast evil of the world. After years of separation, they are miraculously reunited in America, the land of their dreams. Tatiana and Alexander have since suffered the worst the twentieth century had to offer. A novel tracing the enduring power of love and commitment against the forces of war and the equally dangerous forces of keeping the peaceįrom the bestselling author of The Girl in Times Square, comes the magnificent conclusion to the saga that was set in motion when Tatiana fell in love with her Red Army officer, Alexander Belov, in wartime Leningrad in 1941.

The summer garden by paullina simons