Lost Roses: A Novel

“How unfair it was, to die so young, just so a spoiled woman from Moscow could have her flowers.”

In the early chapters, Sofya is often willfully ignorant of the rampant inequality around her. Here, however, she shows her first glimmers of social awareness. Later, her own flower will become a symbol of survival as she grows to understand more about herself and the world around her.

“Though a dedicated ruler, the tsar was not at all suited to the monarch’s life of high-pressure decisions. He was happiest in the country at his beloved Alexander Palace, with the tsarina and their five children, playing tennis or dominoes.”

The narrator here lists tennis and dominoes as family activities, two things which are intrinsically associated with leisure and wealth. This highlights the emotional distance the tsar’s family has from its people. The image of hiding away in the palace foreshadows the family’s later exile once ousted from the throne and shows that their defeat was ultimately a result of their selfish choices and lack of care for the lower classes.

“The whole thing was quite exhilarating, almost worth the stitches, and I might have enjoyed it despite my gaping wound had dear Sofya not been traumatized. She hovered over me, face drained of color.”

In this moment, Sofya is soft-hearted and unable to handle the threat of violence—in particular its visual manifestation in Eliza’s wound. Because Sofya later becomes an inadvertent killer herself and is pushed to new limits in pursuit of her goals, portraying her in this way early on lays the groundwork for her dynamic character development and growth.

“Blessed with remarkable charm for a girl her age, her intellect far exceeded my own, but she was not off-putting as some child savants can be. The name Luba means ‘love’ and the child personified the word.”

Although Luba is only given two chapters to narrate within the novel, these chapters serve to frame the trajectory of the story. This moment highlights her relationship with those around her and with the world itself, and the way she becomes a unifying thread in times of crisis. Even though she is the youngest, Sofya finds her inspiring and often looks to her memory to guide her.

“‘[T]hough we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.’”

This quote-within-quote-within-quote is a reference to the American essayist and scholar Ralph Waldo Emerson, which Eliza’s mother reaches for in order to succinctly convey her message. Although she is in this moment referring to travel for pleasure, the moment foreshadows the world travels Eliza and Sofya will undergo on their respective journeys. In this sense, “the beautiful” refers to the hope and inner strength they carry with them along the way.

“It looked innocent enough: a golden sheaf of wheat, the silver-bladed scythe resting at its base. But nothing good ever came of that card.”

This image juxtaposes silver and gold, as well as the aggressive metal tool against the natural imagery of the harvest. These contrasts allude to the same conflict between the lower agricultural classes and the wealthy, or silver, classes. While the scythe is usually the object cutting down the wheat (which parallels the wealthy cutting down the poor through their taxes), here it is shown lying down below the wheat, which foreshadows the impending inversion of social class.

“Since the two had known each other at school, they’d fought with fists over a variety of issues, including me. Injuries were usually minor, though Merrill had once received Henry’s ire in the shape of two black eyes. Henry quickly presented Merrill with two steaks to bring down the swelling, which Henry cooked and they ate that night, quite happily friends again.”

This moment highlights the unique three-way friendship between Eliza, Henry, and Merrill. Although they are in a classic love triangle and there is animosity between the two men, as there is later between Eliza and Merrill as she blames him for Henry’s death, there is also real love between all of them. This memory of animosity turning very quickly to friendship creates a space in which Eliza can carry both men with her in spirit as she moves forward into the future.

“She must have been caught speaking Russian again, hence Agnessa’s punishment: wearing the ‘devil’s bell.’ Little did Agnessa know Luba liked the bell and considered it a badge of honor for, though French and English were more fashionable, Russian had been our Mother’s language of choice.”

Although Sofya and Luba’s mother never appears in the novel, her presence is keenly felt throughout both girls’ lives. One of the book’s core themes is Complex Maternal Relationships, and here we see how Luba’s mother continues to live in her mind even after her death. Luba prefers Russian because it was the language her mother spoke, and this act of allegiance to her mother is worth more to her than pleasing Agnessa or gaining the social status that comes with speaking English and French. .

“Max looked up at me, smiled, and then jumped a little. I held him tighter and felt a pull in my belly. It was as if Papa himself had answered my prayers and dropped little Max into my arms.”

Varinka has a strong tendency to deflect responsibility for her actions onto others. This is not the only time she uses her absent father to justify her theft of another woman’s child. This moment foreshadows her choices later in the novel, which are powered by a need for the cohesive, loving family unit that she has been denied. By attributing her newfound connection with Max to the influence of her father, she draws a thread between the two of them that links them all together as a family spread across time.

“We spread a few coverlets and featherbeds on the floor to do what Luba called ‘camping out,’ to sleep there, which Max enjoyed immensely.”

This image of camping on the floor becomes a recurring motif throughout the novel as Max clings to his heritage and identity. Later, Varinka and her mother will both comment on how Max refuses to sleep in a regular bed, as he connects this childhood activity with his true family. Ironically, sleeping on the floor goes from an entertainment to a necessity as Luba and Sofya begin their journeys of hardship; however, it remains something that Max once shared with them and which he believes will in time bring them all back together.

“The best cure for grief is to throw yourself into charity work like a maiden into a volcano.”

This tongue-in-cheek remark about the thrilling danger of humanitarianism highlights the undercurrent of service and self-sacrifice that connects multiple generations of Woolsey women. The author’s first novel focuses on the character of Caroline Woolsey Ferriday, who appears here as Eliza’s daughter, while a follow-up to this novel focuses on another brave woman from this family line. Here, a shared moment connects each central character to this inherited sense of purpose and identity.

“Up on the second floor, the nursery window stood, a dead, dark hole, lights extinguished except for the silver pinpricks of light shining on the ceiling—Luba’s stars.”

Stars are a recurring motif throughout the novel, and they take on different meanings as the story progresses. This project of Luba’s shows the scholarly mind and attention to detail that will ultimately keep her and Sofya alive. Here, the stars stand as a symbol of hope in a place of darkness—something Luba herself becomes for her family in their darkest hours.

“How could a person become so cruel? Was he born that way, ripping his big head through his mother, cursed at birth for killing her? Vladi would do anything for Taras, their friendship forged by years of protecting each other in prison.”

While much of the novel focuses on the power of family, this moment expresses the power of found or created family. Taras is a complex character who has both blood family and found family relationships, but his ultimate loyalty is to those he has chosen and who have chosen him. His relationship with Vladi has similarities to that between Sofya and Eliza, though the latter is a force for positivity and growth rather than chaos and destruction.

“How poor Agnessa had fallen. Before we’d ended up here she’d never once laced her own shoes nor wore the same pair of white cotton gloves twice. Now it took all of us to help her to the filthy chamber pot.”

Of all the central characters, Agnessa most symbolizes the ignorance and entitlement of the noble classes. Her fall into destitution represents the greater societal shift that is taking place around her. Nonetheless, there is a reference here to “all of us” helping her and family relying on family. This idea of interconnectedness and compassion is a continuing thread throughout the novel. Ultimately, Agnessa meets a gruesome end for the choices she made, and her death symbolizes the end of the class system as a whole.

“How strange it was to see the whole village move into the estate, choosing rooms and making themselves comfortable under the crystal lights. It was their right, since the people deserved a fine place to live as much as the Streshnayvas did, but how terrible to see Peter Pavlinov from the hunting goods store spitting on the fine zala rug.”

Here, Varinka’s attitude towards the attacks shows the complexity and nuance of the social debates during this period. Varinka firmly believes in the new order in which all people are considered equal, and each has the right to comfort and luxury. However, she instinctually perceives a wrongness in the way this reshuffling is being enacted. This belief shows that neither side of the conflict is entirely right or wrong, a foundation that many will come to understand over time.

“Many young Southampton men enlisted as the war raged on but somehow the colony felt immune to the struggle and resumed their favorite time-worn, daily cycle: golf, lunch, tennis, and a dip in the ocean.”

Eliza internally criticizes Sofya’s family for their willful ignorance about the brewing social conflict in Russia. Here, however, she finds her own society guilty of the same thing: they seek comfort in the familiar rhythms and indulgences of the everyday. These two parallel attitudes across the world highlight an innate failing of human nature, particularly of those in a position of power, when faced with unstoppable change.

“Did Max even remember Sofya? Mamka often brought up the subject that she was his rightful mother, but I just walked away. Papa had given the child to me and it was too late to change things.”

Varinka again displays her unwillingness to accept responsibility for her own choices, stating that it is “too late” to go back and do the right thing. She cites loyalty to her father’s wishes, yet she ignores her mother’s more present voice of reason. This undercurrent of conflict between Varinka and her mother continues to grow until it indirectly leads her to lose Max for good.

“‘[T]hese Russian women are not our kind. They’re our salvation. For if we stick to just ‘our kind’ we’ll simply exist in this insular, petty world. A world that may be safe and predictable but with all the life wrung out of it.’”

The eldest Woolsey woman’s speech, just past the midpoint of the novel as the narrative gains momentum towards its climax, summarizes the core theme of Cross-Cultural Understanding. She vocalizes the idea that a world filled with “life” needs to be filled with new ideas, new experiences, and compassion for others. While this scene is a literal call to action for those listening, it also serves as a call to action to the reader to incorporate these tenets into their own life.

“At least I was free. I would reunite with Max in Paris. With hard work and cleverness, I could do anything.”

Sofya’s resolve here echoes the influence Luba has left on her, since Luba embodied these traits despite her noble upbringing. Now that Sofya has been stripped of all her worldly comforts and advantages of her birth, determination and ingenuity are all she has left to find her way back to her family. However, by absorbing the skills her sister has inadvertently taught her, she manages to carry part of her family with her on her journey.

“As we rode, enjoying the morning sun, I felt the sugar cubes in my pocket and sat a little straighter in my seat. Now not only a thief, but a cold-blooded killer as well.”

This moment highlights Sofya’s character development from a sheltered young woman who grows faint in times of crisis to a confident outlaw capable of protecting herself. Here she does not shy away from this transformation, but instead embraces it. In this way she comes into her ultimate potential as someone willing to take a stand against injustice and do what is needed to keep herself safe.

“‘In Norse mythology, a giant serpent encircles the world, growing larger each day until it is big enough to devour itself. They believed that moment would trigger the end of the world.’”

This reference to myth can be seen as a metaphor for the Social and Economic Divides that have torn Russia apart, as the aristocratic class has grown so wealthy and powerful that it devours its own country’s resources at an unsustainable rate, triggering a social collapse that effectively ends one world order and opens the door to a new one.

“But the front-page photo that day was not of the kaiser. It was of the former tsar and tsarina and their children, for nothing kept the public’s attention like that family, even months after they were rumored dead.”

The public’s fascination in this instance reflects the real-world fascination the story of this family still holds, not only in the shape of this novel but in other popular narrative media as well. This shows how a collective of people aren’t necessarily swayed by politics (as characterized by the absent image of the kaiser), but rather by the impact of a well-told story.

“‘While I breathe, I hope.’”

This line is first spoken by Sofya’s father and later echoed by Luba much later in the novel. There is no direct reference to the father in the second instance, so it is easy to miss the underlying connection between the two. The father’s hope has been extinguished because he no longer breathes; however, Luba carries this hope forward with her into her own life, honoring her family and their memory in the process.