Elizabeth Kerri Mahon

Kaleen Koen's new novel BEFORE VERSAILLES, is as much about Nicolas Fouquet as it is about Louis XIV.  One of the places mentioned in the book is Vaux-le-Vicomte (the chateau that Nicolas Fouquet is building during the novel). Vaux-le-Vicomte still exists and you can visit it either n the flesh or online. The chateau was built between 1658 and 1661 for Fouquet who was Louis XIV's superintendent of finances. It was supposed to be a  monument to his oversized ego and ambition. Fouquet never got to enjoy his chateau for long because Louis XIV had him arrested and imprisoned for life in August of 1661. He was arrested at the chateau shortly after a fete where Moliere's play 'Les Facheaux' debuted.  The King had been suspicious about Fouquet's actions for months and the chateau just served to verify them.  It was too large and too impressive for the King's liking. Fouquet  had actually built a special section of the chateau for the King but it was too late. F...

Title:  Before Versailles Author:  Karleen Koen Pub. Date: June 28, 2011 Publisher: Crown Publishing Group Format: Hardcover, 480pp Verdict:  Run Don't Walk to the Bookstore to buy this book! Synopsis:  Louis XIV is one of the best-known monarchs ever to grace the French throne. But what was he like as a young man—the man before Versailles? After the death of his prime minister, Cardinal Mazarin, twenty-two-year-old Louis steps into governing France. He’s still a young man, but one who, as king, willfully takes everything he can get—including his brother’s wife. As the love affair between Louis and Princess Henriette burns, it sets the kingdom on the road toward unmistakable scandal and conflict with the Vatican. Every woman wants him. He must face what he is willing to sacrifice for love. But there are other problems lurking outside the chateau of Fontainebleau: a boy in an iron mask has been seen in the woods, and the king’s finance minister, Nicolas...

The Magic Circle, John William Waterhouse (1886) One of the first witchcraft trials in Ireland involved a woman named Dame Alice Kyteler. Her case involved the first recorded claims of a witching having intercourse with demons. For over 700 hundred years, her story has fascinated historians. Was she truly a witch or was she a victim brought up on trumped up charges by her jealous and envious stepchildren? Somewhere in the moldy pages of an ancient tome in a dusty library lies the true answer. Witch-hunting was big business in Medieval Europe. It is estimated that some 100,000 men and women were executed on suspicion of witchcraft during this period, and laws against witchcraft remained on the books as late as the 19th century. In Ireland, however, there were still people who followed the old ways, blending the ancient Celtic religion with Christianity. There were very few witch hunts so the trial of Dame Alice Kyteler sent shockwaves throughout the country. Dame Alice Kyteler was a...

This weekend I had the great fortune to attend the 4th Historical Novel Society conference in North America. The Historical Novel Society has been alternating having the conference in England and North America over the past few years.  I had only just found out about the society 4 years ago when they had their Albany conference, and I couldn't attend the conference 2 years ago when it was held just outside Chicago. However, since this year SCANDALOUS WOMEN came out, and there was a nice review in the Historical Novel Review, I decided to attend.  Over the years, I've attended various RWA (Romance Writers of America) conferences which have been wonderful, but my writing has gone in a different direction over the years, so I felt it was important to attend a conference that was close to the genre that I want to write. Plus, it was nice to be amongst my people for a weekend, authors and readers who love history as much as I do, who talk about historical figures like Eleanor of Aq...

Princess Margaret and John Bindon photographed on Mustique A few months ago, I watched a little British film called The Bank Job. The film is based on the 1971 robbery of Lloyd's Bank in London to steal photographs kept in a safe deposit box, and subsequently hushed up by MI5. The photographs were rumored to be of Princess Margaret in a compromising position set on a Caribbean beach with a small-time gangster and actor by the name of John Bindon although he’s not specifically named in the film. The robbery became known as the “walkie-talkie bank job” because a member of the public overheard the robbers talking on a two-way radio. I had never heard that Princess Margaret had been involved with a gangster, so I was intrigued. However, flipping through the two biographies of Princess Margaret that I own, one by Christopher Warwick and the most recent by Tim Heald, Warwick doesn’t mention him at all and Heald dismisses the rumors. So I turned to the good old Internet to do some rese...

Messalina holding her son Britannicus, Louvre The Roman Empire may have produced some of the most cruelly ambitious women in history. But one name stands out above all the rest. Her name is Messalina. Anyone who has seen the 1970’s miniseries I CLAUDIUS based on the Robert Graves novel has just an inkling of the crimes that have been attached to her name over the centuries. According to historians, by the time of her death, she had gleefully dispatched her enemies with ruthless zeal, taken a host of lovers, and turned the Emperor into the biggest cuckold in Rome. But was she really as bad as historians have made her out to be? Or is this just another case of men being afraid of powerful women? Born Valeria Messalina, she was the first born and second child of Domitia Lepida the Younger and Marcus Valerius Messalla Barbatus. Both her grandmothers had been not only half-sisters, but also nieces of Augustus Caesar. As a tender teenager, she became the fourth wife of much older cousin ...

Title:  THE CHURCHILLS IN LOVE AND WAR Author:  Mary S. Lovell Hardcover: 624 pages Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 1St Edition edition Pub Date:  May 9, 2011 Description :  Of all Britain’s great families perhaps none has been so overshadowed by the force of one member’s personality as the Churchills. And yet in this vivid and brilliant tale of the dynasty – of which Gladstone remarked, ‘There never was a Churchill from John of Marlborough down who had either morals or principles’– theirs turns out to be a narrative of epic breadth and drama. From the First Duke of Marlborough – soldier of genius, restless empire-builder and cuckolder of Charles II – onwards, the Churchills have been politicians, gamblers and profligates, heroes and womanisers. The family continued to flourish in the nineteenth and twentieth-century, achieving power and influence in both Britain and America, helped by marriages to the ravishing and wealthy New York society beauties J...