Confession: I borrowed this book solely for the title. I wasn’t quite sure what it was about (something historical?) but I like tea so I figured I would like this. When I started reading, I realised this was about the Russian and British royal families and was a lot heavier than I expected.

The Imperial Tea Party focuses on one thing: three meetings between the Tsar Nicholas II and his family with Queen Victoria and her family. The two families are related by marriage, with the Tsarina Alix (Alicky) being the granddaughter of Queen Victoria. The three meetings covered are: a 1896 meeting at Balmoral, a 1908 meeting at Reval (this is after the death of Queen Victoria), and a last meeting in 1906 on the Isle of Wright.

When I say that this book covers the three meetings mentioned above, I mean that they only cover the three meetings mentioned above. There is a link from the third meeting to the end of the Russian monarchy, but otherwise the book doesn’t give much information about the years before and after the meetings. Luckily, I had read a book about Queen Victoria and her familial ties to most of Europe a few years back, as well as one or two other books about the royal families before World War I, so I had an idea about what was going on, but I imagine that if you were new to the history of the British and Russian royals, you might get confused about what was going on.

But, this book does go into a lot of detail about what happened during the meetings. From the weather to the diary entries of the various people involved to the food, everything is laid bare. If you’re passionately interested about the meetings of the Russian and British royals, you’ll probably get all the information you want from this book.

I’d say that this book would be interesting to people who already have some knowledge of the last Russian royal family and Queen Victoria’s family and want to know a bit more about these very specific points in history. But if you’re new to them or are looking for something a bit more general on the families, this may not be what you want.