From Publishers Weekly
In 1717, Prussian emperor Frederick I presented Peter the Great with a remarkable treasure: enough wall-sized panels covered with meticulously carved amber to decorate an entire room. Eventually installed in a palace near St. Petersburg, the Amber Room was stolen by the Nazis during the 1941 siege of Leningrad and hidden in Königsberg (now Kaliningrad)—after which little is certain. Levy and Scott-Clark (The Stone of Heaven) devote as much space to their efforts to sift through the sparse evidence as to their reconstructions, and though the story line is a bit muddled early on, when they also try to squeeze in the room's history, they eventually find a comfortable balance. Digging through files from former Soviet museums and the East German secret police, they retrace previous investigations and slowly realize just how valuable the missing room was to the Soviets as Cold War propaganda. Even after the collapse of communism, its potential recovery continues to stoke the flames of Russians' memories of the Great Patriotic War, and the probe raises important (though unfortunately unanswered) questions about the Red Army's activities as the war wound down in Europe. The pair of investigative journalists never quite manages to distract readers from the inevitable failure of their search, so the probable fate of the room, when finally broached, may strike some as anticlimactic. However, the authors do offer an intriguing peek at the inner workings of Soviet bloc espionage—along with a detour into the avariciousness of some contemporary Russians. 50 b&w images, 3 maps. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


From School Library Journal
Adult/High School–This title might seem at first to be small-scale popular history, telling the tale of one of the more ornate artifacts of the 18th century. Yet the Amber Room is even more noteworthy for its historical importance. Originally designed for and begun by the Prussian royal family, it was still unfinished when they gave it to Peter the Great of Russia; it was completed and assembled in the lifetime of his successor, Catherine the Great. In 1941, the Germans overran the palace into which the room was fitted and it was moved to Königsberg, only to disappear as the Third Reich collapsed and the German city fell to the Red Army. The book details the hunt for the Amber Room, which has involved persons from Russia and both Germanys as well as one well-connected Russian émigré, a host of magazines, various spies, and occasional outbursts of popular enthusiasm. This alone makes for a gripping tale, but as the book progresses it becomes apparent that there is another level to this treasure hunt. The modern-day searchers, the authors and their allies, must deal with the agendas of previous hunters and of the guardians of the archives. Clear maps and average-quality photos are included. This engrossing book combines history, detection, and adventure.–Ted Westervelt, Library of Congress, Washington, DC Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


From Booklist
Among myriad Nazi crimes, the looting of the art treasures of occupied countries was significant. Some of these treasures have been recovered and returned to national museums; some have found their way into private collections via shady brokers; some have never been recovered, and the most prominent of those is the Amber Room of Russia. Frederick I of Prussia gave these amber panels to Czar Peter the Great. They were apparently seized during the German seige of Leningrad in 1941, and for six decades their fate has remained a mystery. Levy and Scott-Clark are prizewinning investigative journalists who have used declassified files of the KGB and East German Stasi, recollections of insiders, and solid detective work to tell an exciting, intense, and surprising story. It is filled with episodes of cold-war intrigue, cynicism, amoral betrayal, and bureaucratic stalling that degenerates into absurdity. The assertions by Levy and Scott-Clark that they have solved the mystery cannot be verified yet, but they certainly provide us with a thrilling work. Jay Freeman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"The Amber Room was one of mankind's greatest treasures, a masterpiece of staggering ambition and value. Commissioned by Frederick I of Prussia in 1701, its vast and intricately worked amber panels - many times more valuable than gold - were sent in 1717 as a gift to Peter the Great of Russia. Passed on by imperial succession, the room was finally erected by Catherine the Great in her palace outside St. Petersburg, where it became legendary throughout the world." "A symbol of Russia's glory, the Amber Room remained in the village of Tsarskoye Selo for almost two hundred years. When the Nazi army invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, Soviet curators evacuated millions of precious objects; however, the Amber Room was too fragile to dismantle, so they were forced to hide it. But it was found: Its panels were wrenched from the walls, packed into crates, and taken to Konigsberg on the Baltic coast, where they remained until the Nazi surrender in April 1945. The Amber Room has never been seen since." "In the last sixty years, hundreds of people have spent tens of millions of dollars tracing the whereabouts of the Amber Room, to no avail. Catherine Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy have gone farther along the trail of this great, lost treasure than anyone before them and, in a masterpiece of detection, have at last unraveled the jumble of evidence surrounding its fate. Their search catapulted them across eastern Europe and into the menacing world of espionage and counterespionage that still exists in Russia and the former Soviet bloc. In archives in St. Petersburg and Berlin, amid boxes of hitherto unseen diaries, letters, and classified reports, they have uncovered an astounding conspiracy to hide the truth." The Amber Room shows incontrovertibly what happened to the most valuable lost treasure in the world and why the truth has been withheld for so long. Its conclusions recolor our understanding of the Cold War and its aftermath.

SYNOPSIS

When the Nazis invaded Russia, they removed and hid the legendary Amber Room built by Catherine the Great in her St. Petersburg palace. Immersing themselves in Cold War intrigues, London-based journalists traveled widely to investigate this lost treasure's fate. Maps and b&w photos situate the geographic and historical contexts. Scott-Clark and Levy are the authors of The Stone of Heaven: Unearthing the Secret History of Imperial Green Jade (2002). Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

In 1717, Prussian emperor Frederick I presented Peter the Great with a remarkable treasure: enough wall-sized panels covered with meticulously carved amber to decorate an entire room. Eventually installed in a palace near St. Petersburg, the Amber Room was stolen by the Nazis during the 1941 siege of Leningrad and hidden in Konigsberg (now Kaliningrad)-after which little is certain. Levy and Scott-Clark (The Stone of Heaven) devote as much space to their efforts to sift through the sparse evidence as to their reconstructions, and though the story line is a bit muddled early on, when they also try to squeeze in the room's history, they eventually find a comfortable balance. Digging through files from former Soviet museums and the East German secret police, they retrace previous investigations and slowly realize just how valuable the missing room was to the Soviets as Cold War propaganda. Even after the collapse of communism, its potential recovery continues to stoke the flames of Russians' memories of the Great Patriotic War, and the probe raises important (though unfortunately unanswered) questions about the Red Army's activities as the war wound down in Europe. The pair of investigative journalists never quite manages to distract readers from the inevitable failure of their search, so the probable fate of the room, when finally broached, may strike some as anticlimactic. However, the authors do offer an intriguing peek at the inner workings of Soviet bloc espionage-along with a detour into the avariciousness of some contemporary Russians. 50 b&w images, 3 maps. (June) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

One of the more enduring mysteries of lost treasures has been that of the Amber Room-a room in the Catherine Palace in Pushkin, outside of Leningrad (St. Petersburg), that was lined with amber panels given to Peter the Great in 1717 by Frederick I of Prussia. The panels disappeared during the 1941 Nazi invasion and have never been seen since. Levy and Scott-Clark (investigative journalists for the Guardian and coauthors, The Stone of Heaven: Unearthing the Secret History of Imperial Green Jade) present the tortuous story of what they believe happened to this "eighth wonder of the world." Illustrated with 50 black-and-white images and three maps, the narrative begins with the order issued on June 22, 1941, from Lengorispolkom (Leningrad's executive committee) to evacuate the area's treasures and investigates the trail of misleading and sometimes contradictory accounts of that evacuation. The authors' conclusion: belief that the Amber Room survived, hidden by the Nazis in Thuringia, Saxony, or Kaliningrad, is untenable. It never left Leningrad. Instead, it was destroyed by the Red Army in April 1945 after the German surrender of the city. The "great untruth" propagated by Soviet authorities, they suggest, perpetuated the Soviet belief in the victimization of the East at the hands of the West. Given their careful documentation of sources, including previously unseen archives, manuscripts, and private papers, the conclusion is plausible, but the absence of eyewitness reports leaves enough doubt to instill hope in the romantic. Recommended for larger public libraries, especially those with an interest in World War II and its aftermath.-Robert C. Jones, Warrensburg, MO Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

School Library Journal

Adult/High School-This title might seem at first to be small-scale popular history, telling the tale of one of the more ornate artifacts of the 18th century. Yet the Amber Room is even more noteworthy for its historical importance. Originally designed for and begun by the Prussian royal family, it was still unfinished when they gave it to Peter the Great of Russia; it was completed and assembled in the lifetime of his successor, Catherine the Great. In 1941, the Germans overran the palace into which the room was fitted and it was moved to Konigsberg, only to disappear as the Third Reich collapsed and the German city fell to the Red Army. The book details the hunt for the Amber Room, which has involved persons from Russia and both Germanys as well as one well-connected Russian emigre, a host of magazines, various spies, and occasional outbursts of popular enthusiasm. This alone makes for a gripping tale, but as the book progresses it becomes apparent that there is another level to this treasure hunt. The modern-day searchers, the authors and their allies, must deal with the agendas of previous hunters and of the guardians of the archives. Clear maps and average-quality photos are included. This engrossing book combines history, detection, and adventure.-Ted Westervelt, Library of Congress, Washington, DC Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews