When catherine forces the catholic marguerite to marry her protestant cousin Henry of Navarre against her will, and then uses her opulent Parisian wedding as a means of luring his followers to their deaths, she creates not only savage conflict within France but also a potent rival within her own family.
Rich in detail and vivid prose, Goldstone's narrative unfolds as a thrilling historical epic. The riveting true story of mother-and-daughter queens Catherine de' Medici and Marguerite de Valois, whose wildly divergent personalities and turbulent relationship changed the shape of their tempestuous and dangerous century.
Set in magnificent renaissance france, this is the story of two remarkable women, a mother and daughter driven into opposition by a terrible betrayal that threatened to destroy the realm. Catherine de' medici was a ruthless pragmatist and powerbroker who dominated the throne for thirty years. The rival queens is a dangerous tale of love, and the true nature of courage, ambition, betrayal, the echoes of which still resonate.
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Daughters of the Winter Queen: Four Remarkable Sisters, the Crown of Bohemia, and the Enduring Legacy of Mary, Queen of Scots
Upon her father's ascension to the illustrious throne of England, Elizabeth Stuart was suddenly thrust from the poverty of unruly Scotland into the fairy-tale existence of a princess of great wealth and splendor. Beautiful henrietta Maria would be the only sister to marry into royalty, although at great cost.
Louisa was a gifted painter whose engaging manner and appealing looks provoked heartache and scandal. But it was the youngest, sophia, who fulfilled the promise of her great-grandmother Mary and reshaped the British monarchy, whose ready wit and good-natured common sense masked immense strength of character, a heroine in the tradition of a Jane Austen novel, a legacy that endures to this day.
Brilliantly researched and captivatingly written, and adventure but also love, and humor, filled with danger, by refusing to surrender to adversity, treachery, Daughters of the Winter Queen follows the lives of five remarkable women who, courage, changed the course of history. When she was married at sixteen to a German count far below her rank, it was with the understanding that her father would help her husband achieve the kingship of Bohemia.
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The Lady Queen: The Notorious Reign of Joanna I, Queen of Naples, Jerusalem, and Sicily
The lady queen is a captivating portrait of medieval royalty in all its incandescent complexity. A procession of the most important artists and writers of the time frequented her glittering court. Determined to defend herself, Joanna won her acquittal against overwhelming odds. She was widely admired: dedicated to the welfare of her subjects, she reduced crime, built hospitals and churches, and encouraged the licensing of female physicians.
But she never quite escaped the stain of her husband's death, and the turmoil of the times surrounded her -- war, plague, and treachery would ultimately be her undoing. With skill, and impeccable research and detail, passion, Nancy Goldstone brings to life one of history's most remarkable women. On march 15, queen of naples, twenty-two-year-old Joanna I, 1348, stood trial for the murder of her husband before the Pope and his court in Avignon.
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Catherine de Medici: Renaissance Queen of France
Poisoner, despot, necromancer -- the dark legend of Catherine de Medici is centuries old. Based on thousands of private letters, it is a remarkable account of one of the most influential women ever to wear a crown.
Four Queens: The Provencal Sisters Who Ruled Europe
For fans of alison weir and antonia fraser, four queens is the story of four provocative sisters—marguerite, a time of chivalry and crusades, knights and monarchs, Sanchia, troubadors, Eleanor, acclaimed author Nancy Goldstone’s thrilling history of the royal daughters who succeeded in ruling—and shaping—thirteenth-century Europe Set against the backdrop of the thirteenth century, and Beatrice of Provence—who rose from near obscurity to become the most coveted and powerful women in Europe.
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The Maid and the Queen: The Secret History of Joan of Arc
Now, this fascinating book explores the relationship between these two remarkable women, on the six hundredth anniversary of the birth of Joan of Arc, and deepens our understanding of this dramatic period in history. Politically astute, ambitious, queen of Sicily, Yolande of Aragon, and beautiful, was one of the most powerful women of the Middle Ages.
The untold story of the extraordinary queen who championed Joan of Arc. How did an illiterate peasant girl gain access to the future king of France, earn his trust, and ultimately lead his forces into battle? Was it only the hand of God that moved Joan of Arc-or was it also Yolande of Aragon? Caught in the complex dynastic battle of the hundred Years War, her statecraft, Yolande championed the dauphin's cause against the forces of England and Burgundy, drawing on her savvy, and her intimate network of spies.
But the enemy seemed invincible.
Medici Money: Banking, Metaphysics, and Art in Fifteenth-Century Florence Enterprise
But even at the height of the Renaissance, charging interest of any kind meant running afoul of the Catholic Church’s ban on usury. W w norton Company.
Mary Queen of Scots
The new york times ”One of the most fascinating figures in history. The columbus dispatch “with grace, sensitivity, and a sharp eye for detail, lady Antonia Fraser has succeeded not only in recapturing the real Mary from the symbol but also in illuminating the chaotic age in which she lived. Newsweek W w norton Company.
Praise for mary queen of scots“She was sometimes reviled as a scheming whore, sometimes revered as a misunderstood martyr. Her royal birth gave her claim to the thrones of two nations; her marriage to the young French dauphin promised to place a third glorious crown on her noble head. Instead, scandalizing her world with a foolish passion that would lead to abduction, Mary Stuart became the victim of her own impulsive heart, rape and even murder.
Here is her story, a queen who lost a throne for love, a monarch pampered and adored even as she was led to her beheading, the unforgettable woman who became a legend for all time. Betrayed by those she most trusted, only to lose to her envious and unforgiving cousin, she would be lured into a deadly game of power, Elizabeth I.
But she was invariably regarded as fascinating. Delta.
Elizabeth and Mary: Cousins, Rivals, Queens
Protestant elizabeth, the bastard daughter of Anne Boleyn, whose legitimacy had to be vouchsafed by legal means, glowed with executive ability and a visionary energy as bright as her red hair. W w norton Company. Mary, feminine, was charming, the Catholic successor whom England’s rivals wished to see on the throne, and deeply persuasive.
That two such women, queens in their own right, should have been contemporaries and neighbours sets in motion a joint biography of rare spark and page-turning power. Superb. Delta. The drama has terrific resonance even now as women continue to struggle in their bid for executive power.
Daughters of the Winter Queen: Four Remarkable Sisters, the Crown of Bohemia, and the Enduring Legacy of Mary, Queen of Scots
The thrilling family saga of five unforgettable women who remade Europe. Forced into exile, the winter queen and her family found refuge in Holland, where the glorious art and culture of the Dutch Golden Age indelibly shaped her daughters' lives. Louisa was a gifted painter whose engaging manner and appealing looks provoked heartache and scandal.
The thrilling family saga of five unforgettable women who remade EuropeFrom the great courts, granddaughter of the martyred Mary, glittering palaces, Elizabeth Stuart, and war-ravaged battlefields of the seventeenth century comes the story of four spirited sisters and their glamorous mother, Queen of Scots.
Upon her father's ascension to the illustrious throne of England, Elizabeth Stuart was suddenly thrust from the poverty of unruly Scotland into the fairy-tale existence of a princess of great wealth and splendor. Beautiful henrietta Maria would be the only sister to marry into royalty, although at great cost.
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Game of Queens: The Women Who Made Sixteenth-Century Europe
Alison weir sixteenth-century Europe saw an explosion of female rule. A fascinating group biography and a thrilling political epic, Game of Queens explores the lives of some of the most beloved and reviled queens in history. Delta. From isabella of castile, and elizabeth tudor, and her granddaughter Mary Tudor, Anne Boleyn, to Catherine de Medici, these women wielded enormous power over their territories, shaping the course of European history for over a century.
For the first time, Europe saw a sisterhood of queens who would not be equaled until modern times. The thrilling family saga of five unforgettable women who remade Europe.