The Dictator's Wife: A mesmerising novel of deception and BBC 2 Between the Covers Book Club pick

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The beautiful, enigmatic wife of a feared dictator stands trial for her late husband's crimes against the people. The world will finally know the truth. But whose? They were hard times,” Dumbravă says. “It’s always complicated to tell the whole story for people who never experienced any kind of totalitarianism.

Obviously, everyone knew she was an imposter. Those who gave her titles or pressured others to do so … are guilty of having contributed to an intellectual imposture of colossal proportions. Ceaușescu’s reputation was also promoted by Romanian officials who pushed for recognition from respected institutions in the west. Dumbravă says she had a “childish desire” to be showered with gifts from around the world as a sign of her prestige. Isloi believes the Ceaușescus’ craving for international recognition and legitimacy was the reason Elena’s scientific credentials were raised to such heights, but her connection to chemistry research began well before Nicolae came to power. Deletant’s wife, Andrea, who taught Romanian at Bradford University, acted as interpreter at a meeting with the society’s president, the Nobel prize-winning chemist Alexander Todd. Yet, in reality, Elena's success was a fiction. Her reputation was falsely built up thanks to a fraudulent PhD, appointments to Central Committee positions, and extensive propaganda—all helped along by the intervention of the Securitate, Romania's brutal secret police. The path to prestigeMary Jordan, a biographer of Melania Trump, found her more ambitious and knowing – more like Donald Trump – than is often assumed. Berry comments: “She’s very good at disappearing, even when she’s right there, behind her sunglasses.”

It’s a man’s world but these women are married to the men who make this world. I wanted to explore that duality because they’re at the eye of power but it’s slightly off to the left. They’re not paid. Their role often isn’t clear,” Berry says. After the speech, demonstrations grew in number and size each week, usually massing after Friday prayers. So began an escalating cycle of funerals, protests and violence. Over the course of a month the regime’s response became more vicious: first goons, then snipers, then heavy artillery. Authors, if you are a member of the Goodreads Author Program, you can edit information about your own books. Find out how in this guide. Her second novel, The Birdcage Library, is out now: an adventuress discovers an old book containing clues about the disappearance of a woman who vanished 50 years before. Set between a Scottish castle in the 1930s and an exotic animal emporium in Gilded Age New York, it's a twisting Gothic tale of secrets, obsession and murder. Oh, and taxidermy.Her biographer Betea says it is important that those outside Romania share responsibility for the legitimisation of Ceaușescu. In their letter to Elsevier, sent on 10 December, Teodorescu, Isloi, Dumbravă and their co-authors call Ceaușescu’s behaviour “a ruthless act of intellectual misappropriation”. The characterisation is sublime, the depiction of Marija Popa in particular was fabulous. I found I couldn’t help falling in love with her in the same way as all of those around her, even though there was always the threat of her being an absolute monster. I couldn’t decide until the explosive final chapters whether she was guilty or innocent of the charges she faced, but I didn’t’ t really care, and I could completely understand why everyone wanted her attention.

When I read the synopsis for this I got Eva Peron vibes from it and I was totally in. I found this book gripping I couldnt put it down and when it ended I was both devastated that it had finished and immediately wanting to reread it. The writing was great, it was beautifully done, the characters were well developed and relatable- some more than others, Assad appears to have almost a cast a spell on the profile writer, Berry observes. “Personal magnetism and charm is very hard to fight against. You look over here and you don’t look at the extrajudicial killings over there.” The petitions were turned down and Elena had to settle for an honorary degree from the Central London Polytechnic and an honorary fellowship from the Royal Institute of Chemistry. According to Behr, the chancellor of London University, Professor Sir Philip Norman, publicly praised Elena's work, despite the fact that she never wrote a single word of any of her publications. Personally, I’d have like to know more about how she approached creating her characters as well – endowing even relatively minor characters with complex/complicating private hinterlands.

Summary

Ion Mihai Pacepa, the former head of Romania’s intelligence service, who defected in 1978, wrote in his 1987 book Red Horizons that Ceaușescu demanded he arrange for universities in New York and Washington to award her honorary titles.

Asma’s next project was Syria itself. After the decades of central planning and import restrictions, she wanted to rejuvenate Syria. Asma blinded her husband with financial jargon and pushed for the banking sector to open up to private and foreign-run companies. “She wanted to turn Damascus into a regional Dubai, a tax-haven free from financial controls,” recalled a well-connected Syrian economist. It’s the personality cults versus the quite brutish figures that they actually were,” Berry remarks. “Elena liked to present herself as a scientist but couldn’t recognise basic chemistry formulas. That didn’t stop her getting an honorary doctorate from the Royal Society of Chemistry; there’s a campaign at the moment to get her stripped of them.” We are well aware that these titles have ended up in your catalogue through no fault of your own. However, we consider this correction of the scientific record to be crucial.” In 1975, she was awarded Doctor Honoris Causa at both the University of Tehran and Jordan University in Amman. Later, the University of Manila awarded Elena with an honorary doctorate thanks to a large donation that the Ceausescus made during a trip to the Philippines. Elena never admitted to any research malpractice and insisted that institutions really wanted to grant her recognition for her scholarly work. Elena began attending night-school courses in chemistry at the Bucharest Municipal Adult Education Institute. She was soon expelled because she cheated on an exam and never received a bachelor's degree. In fact, the teacher who oversaw the infamous exam "lived in fear of his life for decades afterward" (Behr 140).The author has created an imaginative Eastern European country, and has set the novel in the early 1990s, under the shadow of the fall of communism and the raising of the Iron Curtain. The fictious country of Yanussia was formerly a part of the USSR and now that the doors have been flung open, its populace are gunning for justice against the corruption of the past…or are they? Dumbravă says this is probably why she “specialised” in polymer research in her academic publications.