The House of Special Purpose by John Boyne

Meanwhile, the old Georgy is patching us in on the unhappiness of his life, through alternating chapters that scale back from the current times through the 1970s (a diagnosis, holidays), the 1950s (the death of Uncle Joe, infidelity problems) to the earlier years of the 20th century. Georgy's innocence is evident from the off - he's not trained in being a bodyguard, let alone court etiquette, and as he is unaware of the young man's illness takes time to realise just how important his attendance is. The young Georgy gets snatched by fate to be taken from his home village, somewhere in Russia, to become attendant, bodyguard and friend to the youngest Romanov - Alexei, the haemophiliac heir to the Empire upon whose fate so much could depend. Here we are again in a completely different setting, and time, although the young man naively in a strange world features again. If nothing else the pair showed up the chameleonic brilliance of this young author. There must have been countless people reading the book after watching the film made from The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas and wondering what John Boyne was going to do next, with no idea he had already done something else - the brilliant ribaldry of Mutiny on the Bounty.

It gets over a slightly bitty structure to win through as a success in the end. Summary: One of the 20th Century's more romantic stories retold for the new age.

The House of Special Purpose by John Boyne