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

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He says: “The Romanian embassy in London made strenuous efforts to persuade certain British academic institutions to recognise Elena’s ‘scientific achievements’– she was trumpeted in the Romanian press as ‘a scientist of world renown’, even though her doctorate was the work, I was reliably informed by Romanian sources, of a professor at the University of Iași. Professor Mircea Teodorescu from the Polytechnic University of Bucharest’s Department of Bioresources and Polymer Science, co-authored papers with Elena Ceaușescu between 1984 and 1989. He is part of the push to have her name retracted from scientific works. Elena Ceaușescu was born to a family of farmers and traders in 1916, according to her biography in the Romanian national archives. She attended night school at the Polytechnic Institute in Bucharest for seven years from 1950, and after her graduation went to work at the National Institute for Research and Development in Chemistry and Petrochemistry (ICECHIM), in the department working on elastomers – a type of polymer. A fascinating exploration of absolute power, female agency and the complexities of complicity. Atmospheric, claustrophobic and so elegantly written' - ELLERY LLOYD

I know the phrase “will have you reading long into the night” gets thrown about an awful lot, but it is completely true for this book.The Dictator's Wife is an astounding piece of literature. The author's debut is a historical fiction focused on the small country of Yanussia going through a regime change and seeking to hold the previous leaders to account. I find it fascinating that the author found inspiration from Melania Trump. Ultimately, when an offer from a Washington-based organization did not appear, she was forced to accept the honorary membership from the IAS. She showed her disgust and vehement anti-semitism by claiming that she had to accept a "low-ranked" degree from the hands of a "dirty Jew," Dr. Emanuel Merdinger, then head of the IAS (Pacepa 181).

Strange how glamour enchants us, how it makes us forget. A fur coat insists on us ignoring the abattoir". In Romanian academia, plagiarism is rampant, as is nepotism,” he says. “Sloppy science is ubiquitous, [much of it] a consequence of Elena Ceaușescu’s nefarious and outsized influence in the 70s and 80s.” Strange how glamour enchants us, how it makes us forget. A fur coat insists on us ignoring the abattoir.’ 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? For Laura, the case has a personal meaning. Her mother has never spoken of the horrors she witnessed under the old regime, and remains a shadow of the woman she used to be. As Laura prepares for the trial, she realises that to find the truth, she must enter the web of the dictator's wife. But what secrets lie within?

This commemorative medal from 1974 is one of only a few remaining artifacts from Elena's unique academic career. It reads: "ACADEMICIAN DOCTOR INGINER ELENA CEAUSESCU". Source: www.numisbids.com A captivating story of women's power, love and secrets. As timely and profound as it is unforgettable. The ending left me breathless' - LARA PRESCOTT, New York Times bestselling author of The Secrets We Kept Her mother, Sahar, had ambitious plans for Asma. Her own great-uncle had helped Hafez Assad seize power. Sahar used this connection to get a job at Syria’s embassy in London. She was also keen to promote a match between Asma and Bashar, Hafez’s second son, according to Sam Dagher, author of "Assad Or We Burn the Country”. The two met several times when Bashar was a gangly medical student in London in the 1990s. Elena's rise to the top ranks of academic chemists was, subsequently, smooth. Publications steadily appeared under the name of Professor Doctor Engineer Elena Ceaucescu. It was easy for her to find scientists to publish studies and books in her name; they did not have much of a choice and were handsomely rewarded for their work. An entire organization was involved in translating and distributing "her" works. She never wrote a thing herself during her entire life. I used to be a journalist and the story was inspired by my coverage of the 2016 US election, watching Melania Trump, plus research on the likes of Asma al-Assad, Imelda Marcos etc. It explores female power, moral ambiguity, memory and forgetting, and the mother/daughter relationship.

It was just a matter of chance,” he says. “Before she got her ‘PhD’, and before she got her bachelor of science ‘degree’ in chemistry, she was an unskilled worker in the institute, under the supervision of the person who had most worked on her PhD.” The Dictator’s Wife is published by Headline Review, and is available on Book Depository from 17 February. Bashar grew up in the shadow of his commanding father, and was the only one of six siblings to study abroad. Bashar’s distaste for blood led him to specialise in ophthalmology, one of the less prestigious medical disciplines. His tutor, Edmund Schulenburg, says he was adept at draining cysts.

In fact, I believe that she did not even read those works because I very much doubt she had the ability to understand them,” he says. “I consider that it is a moral issue to correct this.” It was a world in which everything was dictated to you,” he said. “The efforts of the Ceaușescus to pay off foreign debt meant they wanted to avoid any imports which required currency … Everything from oranges to bananas disappeared … And everything was under strict control. You could not sacrifice a cow in your village. It was illegal. You could go to prison if you got caught with some meat.” Hafez was dead by the time Asma moved to Damascus at the end of 2000, but his legacy was ubiquitous, from the Soviet-style architecture to adulatory billboards bearing his face. His support for terrorist organisations across the region had cut off Syria from the West. Bashar’s ascendance was an opportunity to reset relations. Many Syrians were intoxicated by what they saw, but fear inhibited most from coming onto the streets. Then, one night in February in a drab agricultural town called Deraa, south of Damascus, a group of schoolchildren sprayed graffiti on a wall: “It’s your turn next, doctor.”

Eventually, Elena became the head of Romania's Institute for Chemistry. But that was not enough: Elena wanted every chemical institute in the country to come under one central institute in Bucharest, with herself at the helm. She wanted to be called Professor Doctor Engineer, and she found no opposition at the Romanian Academy, since resistance was both futile and dangerous.

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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”. 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. A tapestry from the Ceaușescu era put up for auction in 2018 showing Nicolae Ceaușescu, left, with Elena, right, and his parents. The reputation of the couple has softened among some Romanians in recent years. Photograph: Daniel Mihăilescu/AFP/Getty Images 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). Elena Ceausescu (1916-89) was the wife of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu (1918-89). During the 1970s and 80s, she was one of the two most powerful women on earth (the other was was Margaret Thatcher, the Prime Minister of Great Britain). Her reputation was falsely built up thanks to a fraudulent PhD, appointments to Central Committee positions, and extensive propaganda.