Release date is 2026-05-17

Tuula Temonen and Johanna Kankaanpää

Ruhtinasöitä by Joseph Kessel is a novel written in the early 20th century. Set in a somber Passy boarding house suddenly filled with Russian émigrés, it follows the reserved proprietress Yvette Mesureux and a vivid circle of dispossessed Russians—Maxim Shuvalov, the worn but devoted journalist Aleksei Borkov and his fragile son Vassia, the magnetic Prince Feodor Ashkeliani, and the sisters Natalia and Helena—balancing hardship, pride, and desire in exile. The likely focus is on community, identity, and survival as nostalgia and necessity collide.

The opening of the novel paints the quiet Paris street and Mesureux’s fading, rule-bound pension before the arrival of Shuvalov, whose Nansen passport heralds a wave of Russians that upends her routines and softens her judgment. It then turns intimate: Borkov’s sleepless care for his ailing son culminates in a morning crisis that brings Shuvalov’s calm diagnosis and a ban on Vassia attending festivities. Meanwhile, Prince Feodor plans an Old New Year dinner; Natalia and Helena, with scant means, transform the dreary salon into a feast of food and flowers. As guests gather, Shuvalov presses Feodor to invest his last funds in a car rather than squander them, and the blunt, thrifty ex-industrialist Anton Ivanitsh arrives, sparking a lively talk of work, waste, and starting over—just as he begins to outline a practical proposal. (This is an automatically generated summary.)

Originally published: Helsinki: Oy. Gutenberg, 1930