A new, riveting and definitive biography of Maria Rasputin--the daughter of the infamous Russian mystic who was accused of bringing down an empire.

In THE MAD MONK’S DAUGHTER, Vanity Fair contributor and royals expert Hadley Meares unspools the largely overlooked, almost unbelievable story of Maria Rasputin, the daughter of the infamous Grigory, the Romanovs last spiritual advisor. Maria was born in Siberia, brought to St. Petersburg when she was thirteen to live with her father, and there she played with the Romanov princesses and became her father’s unofficial hostess. After Maria identified her father’s murdered body, she was protected by the royal family until the horrors of the Bolshevik revolution- and her involvement in a plot to save the Romanovs- forced her to escape Russia. And so began the many iterations of Maria Rasputin who steadfastly defended her father’s innocence and benevolence until she died. Maria became a wife, an author, a cabaret dancer, a mother, and a wild animal trainer in Europe and America, where she worked with some of the world's most famous circus performers. After resorting to desperate measures to stay in America, she transformed from a wanted woman into a real life Rosie the Riveter. She met twice with Anna Anderson, the woman who famously claimed to be Grand Duchess Anastasia, and she ultimately fell into the hands of a journalist who wanted to trade on her very famous last name for a financial windfall that never quite materialized.

Maria Rasputin’s story is a story of survival, reinvention, celebrity, notoriety, and identity. Hers was a dark fairy tale life but also a testament to what a strong woman can survive and will into existence. By focusing for the first time on Maria’s point of view, THE MAD MONK’S DAUGHTER reveals a new side of the Romanovs and of Rasputin, humanizing them, and chronicles the aftermath of the fall of Russia for so many who fled. It also captures the prismatic nature of celebrity in our culture, and how the stories we tell about ourselves are the riddles we leave for the world to understand us.