Elizabeth Kerri Mahon

Normally I feature just one book that I feel that readers would enjoy but this month we have a plethora of really cool books. Title:   Writers Between the Covers Authors: Shannon McKennon Schmidt & Joni Rendon Paperback: 256 pages Publisher: Plume (October 29, 2013) Why did Norman Mailer stab his second wife at a party?  Who was Edith Wharton’s secret transatlantic lover? What motivated Anaïs Nin to become a bigamist? Writers Between the Covers rips the sheets off these and other real-life love stories of the literati—some with fairy tale endings and others that resulted in break-ups, breakdowns, and brawls. Among the writers laid bare are Agatha Christie, who sparked the largest-ever manhunt in England as her marriage fell apart; Arthur Miller, whose jaw-dropping pairing with Marilyn Monroe proved that opposites attract, at least initially; and T.S. Eliot, who slept in a deckchair on his disastrous honeymoon. From the best break-up letters to the stor...

On this day in 1755, Marie Antoinette (baptised Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna ) was born at the Hofburg Palace in Vienna, Austria. No, this is not Marie Antoinette, this is moi, dressed as Marie Antoinette.  Two years ago, I had the privilege of reading at Lady Jane's Salon here in New York. The date fell on November 2nd which is Marie's birthday as well as mine. So I decided to dress like her and read a piece on Marie and her relationship with Axel Fersen. The dress I liberated from a theatre company that I worked for years ago. This is the real Marie! Can't you see a resemblance? :) I had planned on writing a post on Marie Antoinette's impact on fashion, but instead I've decided just to post some photos instead. It's clear that in the more than 200 years since her death, Marie Antoinette continues to inspire designers. These photos are from John Galliano's Spring 2010 collection.  Aren't they gorgeous, allthough it must have been a bit to wear. ...

I'm so pleased by how many people stopped by and left comments on Juliet Grey's excellent post.  I wish I could give you all copies of this wonderful book, but unfortunately I can't!  Using random.org, I can announce that the winner of BECOMING MARIE ANTOINETTE is.... Laura Kay Congratulations Laura!  I will be emailing you shortly to get your address. Thank you to everyone who entered! I hope you will keep coming back to Scandalous Women, as I bring you more scintillating stories about some of history's most fascinating women.

Scandalous Women is very pleased to welcome historical fiction author Juliet Grey to the blog.  Juliet is the author of the new trilogy about Marie Antoinette, the first book BECOMING MARIE ANTOINETTE is released today.  Regular readers of my blog know that I am a huge fan of Marie Antoinette, in fact I'm a tad obsessed and have been ever since I learned that she and I shared a birthday. So I was very excited to hear that there was going to be new trilogy that examined her life from her childhood to her death. Isn't the cover gorgeous? Above the strains of the violins and the tinkling of crystal and porcelain, a silvery laugh pierced the air, drawing all attention toward the head of the table. The woman seated at the king’s right had grabbed a morsel off the royal plate with a heavily jeweled hand and popped it into her own mouth. She wore no powder in her flaxen hair, a shade or two more yellow than my own. Her complexion was the color of fresh dairy cream—the better to sho...

The late Duchess of Windsor's jewels went on sale again at Sotheby's. The items up for grabs include this gorgeous bracelet made by Cartier.  The Duke gave his bride many beautiful gifts during their long marriage.  Rumor has it that Madonna has bid on several pieces.  She's currently directing a movie called W.E. about the Windors.  20 pieces of jewelry were sold Tuesday night for 8 million pounds which is roughly I would say almost $16 million dollars. Here is an article from Hello Magazine regarding the sale  and one from the Daily Mail in the UK about the sale itself .  Apparently the Duke didn't always pay for the jewelry that he bought for the Duchess or the jewelers had to wait for a long time for their money.  Perhaps he thought that just the fact that he bought the jewelry and the Duchess was wearing it was payment enough, instead of giving them cold hard cash! If you had the money, would you have bid on an item from the collection? ...

Happy Birthday to Marie Antoinette who was born today (as well as myself and Leah Marie Brown!).  To celebrate Marie's birthday (and mine), I am giving away 2 copies of Carolyn Meyer's YA novel THE BAD QUEEN.  Here is a sneak peek: History paints her as a shallow party girl, a spoiled fashionista, a callous ruler. Perhaps no other royal has been so maligned—and so misunderstood—as Marie-Antoinette. From the moment she was betrothed to the dauphin of France at age fourteen, perfection was demanded of Marie-Antoinette. She tried to please everyone—courtiers, her young husband, the king, the French people—but often fell short of their expectations. Desperate for affection and subjected to constant scrutiny, this spirited young woman can’t help but want to let loose with elaborate parties, scandalous fashions, and unimaginable luxuries. But as Marie-Antoinette’s lifestyle gets ever-more recklessly extravagant, the peasants of France are suffering from increasing poverty—and beco...

Since Marie Antoinette and I share a birthday, every year I've done a Marie Antoinette themed post. This year, I thought I would examine Marie's birth chart. I've copied the chart from a web-site called astrotheme . If you want to read a longer more in depth version of Marie's birth chart, you can do so at the web-site. I read somewhere on line that when Marie Antoinette was born, an astrologer predicted that she would lead an unhappy life, and her eventual fate. I'm pretty sure that is just a myth. Marie Antoinette was born during the Age of Enlightenment, the era when Kings or Queens had a court astrologer were more than likely over. I do think that you can learn a lot about a person from a pyschological standpoint by looking at their birthchart. Certainly pyschoanalysts like Carl Jung were fascinating by what a birth chart can reveal about a person. I've personally always been fascinated by astrology ever since I was old enough to know exactly what it was...

It was a tabloid editor’s wet dream. It had everything, Royalty, expensive jewelry, the Catholic Church, and a shady deal. The only problem? The Queen knew nothing about it. But you can just imagine the headlines. "MILLION DOLLAR NECKLACE DISAPPEARS-CHURCH HEAD CLAIMS HE GIFTED QUEEN-PALACE SOURCES DENY" or "QUEEN IN SECRET RENDEZVOUS IN PALACE GARDEN." On the surface it sounds absolutely absurd like a bad spy movie but you can’t make this stuff up. Once again, real life is more fantastic than anything novelist could dream of. The story of the Affair of the Necklace has intrigued historians and novelists over the past two hundred years. Everyone has had a crack at it, from the English historian Thomas Carlyle to Alexandre Dumas. Several years major Hollywood film starring Academy Award winner Hilary Swank was filmed and bombed (You can read a recent review of the film here . But you can just imagine what the studio memo* was like: Maverick Studios To: Sam Strutt, H...

This is a special post for me, because Marie Antoinette and I share a birthday, and from childhood I've been fascinated with the beautiful Queen who lost her head in the French Revolution. For along time Marie Antoinette suffered from the reputation as being nothing more than an empty-headed beautiful woman who famously declared to the masses, "Let them eat cake!" (Actually according to Antonia Fraser in her biography of the Queen, she never said this.) But was she a victim of circumstances or did she contribute to the demise of the monarchy by her prolifigate and licentious behavior at court? Recently, several new biographies that are a little more sympathetic to Marie Antoinette have come out and Sophia Coppola's movie was released last year (which I saw on my birthday). Marie Antoinette was born Maria Antonia on November 2, 1755 in the Hofburg Palance in Vienna, to Empress Maria Theresa and her husband Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor and Duke of Lorraine. Maria was ...