The Last Station : A Novel of Tolstoy's Final Year

Now a major motion picture starring Helen Mirren, Christopher Plummer and James McAvoy

It's 1910.
The life of Leo Tolstoy is moving towards its close.

The assistant: 'Since my conversion to Tolstoyism, I was hungry for God, hungry to learn, to perfect my soul.'

The most celebrated figure in Russia is surrounded.

The daughter: 'I have made myself indispensable to Papa, and he is grateful. He loves me now, much as I love him.'

A colony of acolytes and administrators jostle for his favour.

The doctor: 'I am not so foolish as to think that he is Christ. But Leo Nikolayevich is certainly one of his prophets.'

Torn by the contradictions between his egalitarian creed and his privileged situation, he finds himself desperate for peace.

The wife: 'I know it for sure now. They'll do anything to come between me and my husband.'

Drawing on the writings of Tolstoy and his intimates, dancing bewitchingly between fact and fiction, The Last Station evokes brilliantly the battle for the tortured soul of a genius.

Praise for The Last Station:

‘Poets who write novels are a strange and wonderful breed, in love with language as well as character. In The Last Station, Jay Parini has tackled an awesomely ambitious novel and succeeded brilliantly.'

Erica Jong

'Stylish, beautifully paced and utterly beguiling.'

Sunday Times

One of the best historical novels written in the last twenty years.’

Gore Vidal

‘One of those rare works of fiction that manages to demonstrate both scrupulous historical research and true originality of voice and perception…What lifts this book high above most historical novels is Jay Parini’s remarkable ability to enter the minds of his characters.’

New York Times Book Review