Royalty Between The Sheets, Nonfiction Books
Top 10 Royalty Between The Sheets, Nonfiction Books
: Sex with the Queen: 900 Years of Vile Kings, Virile Lovers, and Passionate Politics, Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King, The Serpent and the Moon: Two Rivals for the Love of a Renaissance King, Madame de Pompadour, Madame de Pompadour: A Life, Nell Gwyn: Mistress to a King, The Kings' Mistresses: The Liberated Lives of Marie Mancini, Princess Colonna, and Her Sister Hortense, Duchess Mazarin, The Secret Wife of Louis XIV: Françoise d'Aubigné, Madame de Maintenon, Athenais: The Life of Louis XIV's Mistress, the Real Queen of France, Madame du Barry: The Wages of Beauty
| Author | Eleanor Herman |
| ISBN | 0060846739 |
In royal courts bristling with testosterone—swashbuckling generals, polished courtiers, and virile cardinals—how did repressed regal ladies find happiness?
Anne Boleyn flirted with courtiers; Catherine Howard slept with one. Henry VIII had both of them beheaded.
Catherine...
Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King
| Author | Antonia Fraser |
| ISBN | 0385509847 |
The self-proclaimed Sun King, Louis XIV ruled over the most glorious and extravagant court in seventeenth-century Europe. Now, Antonia Fraser goes behind the well-known tales of Louis’s accomplishments and follies, exploring in riveting detail his intimate relationships with women.
The...
| Author | Princess Michael of Kent |
| ISBN | 0743251067 |
Set against the stunning backdrop of Renaissance France, The Serpent and the Moon is a true story of love, war, intrigue, betrayal, and persecution. At its heart is one of the world's greatest love stories: the lifelong devotion of King Henri II of France to Diane de Poitiers, a beautiful aristocrat...
When Madame de Pompadour became the mistress of Louis XV, no one expected her to retain his affections for long. A member of the bourgeoisie rather than an aristocrat, she was physically too cold for the carnal Bourbon king, and had so many enemies that she could not travel publicly without risking a pelting...
| Author | Évelyne Lever |
| ISBN | 0312310501 |
A sumptuous new biography of one of the most famous dangerous liaisons
When Jeanne Antoinette Poisson was a child, a fortune-teller predicted that she would one day be the mistress of a king. Born into the financial bourgeoisie that was a world apart from the royal court, the beautiful Jeanne Antoinette...
Nell Gwyn: Mistress to a King
| Author | Charles Beauclerk |
| ISBN | 0802142745 |
Written by a direct descendant of the union between Nell Gwyn and King Charles II, Nell Gwyn tells the story of one of England’s great folk heroines, a woman who rose from an impoverished, abusive childhood to become King Charles II’s most cherished mistress, and the star of one of the great love stories...
The Kings' Mistresses: The Liberated Lives of Marie Mancini, Princess Colonna, and Her Sister Hortense, Duchess Mazarin
| Author | Elizabeth C. Goldsmith |
| ISBN | 1586488899 |
The Mancini Sisters, Marie and Hortense, were born in Rome, brought to the court of Louis XIV of France, and strategically married off by their uncle, Cardinal Mazarin, to secure his political power base. Such was the life of many young women of the age: they had no independent status under the law and...
| Author | Veronica Buckley |
| ISBN | 0374158304 |
Françoise d’Aubigné, marquise de Maintenon and secret wife of the Sun King, Louis XIV, was born in a bleak French prison in 1635, her father a condemned traitor and murderer, her mother the warden’s seduced daughter. A timely pardon and a hopeful Caribbean colonial venture failed to mend the...
Athenais: The Life of Louis XIV's Mistress, the Real Queen of France
| Author | Lisa Hilton |
| ISBN | 0316778516 |
I've been watching the BBC show Versailles lately, and it made me want to dive back into some fun, slutty Louis XIV history. Luckily, I picked this book up in a secondhand store years ago, and was apparently just waiting for the right time to read it.
Athenais de Montespan life story follows a pattern...
Born the illegitimate daughter of a monk and a seamstress, Madame du Barry rose from poverty to become one of the most powerful and wealthy women of France. A courtesan, she became Louis XV's official mistress and was fêted as one of France's most beautiful women. On Louis XV's death she became vulnerable...
The Book of the Courtesans: A Catalogue of Their Virtues
| Author | Susan Griffin |
| ISBN | 0767904516 |
They charmed some of Europe’s most illustrious men, honing their social skills as well as their sexual ones, and accumulating wealth, fame, and power along the way. Unlike their geisha counterparts, courtesans didn't lived in brothels or bend their wills to suit their suitors. They were the muses...
| Author | Jeannette Lucraft |
| ISBN | 0750932619 |
Wife to the son of a king, mother of numerous important people and the ancestress of many of the royal houses of Europe, Katherine Swynford is someone whose importance to history is not reflected in the documents and written record of the time she lived. No letters written by her survive and not even her...
A Royal Affair: George III and His Scandalous Siblings
The acclaimed author of Aristocrats returns with a major new book that reveals the story of a regal family plagued by scandal and notoriety and trapped by duty, desire, and the protocols of royalty.
History remembers King George III of England as the mad monarch who lost America. But as a young man,...
| Author | Julia P. Gelardi |
| ISBN | 0312371055 |
The powerful and moving story of three royal mothers whose quest for power led to the downfall of their daughters.
Queen Isabella of Castile, Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, and Queen Victoria of England were respected and admired rulers whose legacies continue to be felt today. Their...
| Author | Anne Somerset |
| ISBN | 0312330170 |
The Affair of the Poisons, as it became known, was an extraordinary episode that took place in France during the reign of Louis XIV. When poisoning and black magic became widespread, arrests followed. Suspects included those among the highest ranks of society. Many were tortured and numerous executions...
Mrs. Keppel and Her Daughter
| Author | Diana Souhami |
| ISBN | 0312195176 |
Alice Keppel, the married lover of Queen Victoria's eldest son and great-grandmother to Camilla Parker-Bowles, was a key figure in Edwardian society. Hers was the acceptable face of adultery. Discretion was her hallmark. It was her art to be the king's mistress and yet to laud the Royal Family and the...
Love Letters of Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn
| Author | Henry VIII of England |
| ISBN | 1410108945 |
The Letters of Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn is perhaps the most remarkable document of the kind known to exist. The letters appear to have been written after Anne Boleyn had been sent away from court, in consequence of reports injurious to her reputation, which had begun to be publicly circulated. Her removal...
Behind the Palace Doors: Five Centuries of Sex, Adventure, Vice, Treachery, and Folly from Royal Britain
| Author | Michael Farquhar |
| ISBN | 0812979044 |
Spanning 500 years of British history, a revealing look at the secret lives of some great (and not-so-great) Britons, courtesy of one of the world's most engaging royal historians
Beleaguered by scandal, betrayed by faithless spouses, bedeviled by ambitious children, the kings and queens...
| Author | Andrew Rose |
| ISBN | 1250041333 |
From the glittering dance halls of Paris during World War I to the maisons de rendezvous, luxurious châteaus in the French countryside, The Woman Before Wallis recounts the untold story of Prince Edward's tempestuous affair with a Parisian courtesan and the scandalous aftermath that has remained...
| Author | Nigel Cawthorne |
| ISBN | 1853755362 |
Prion’s internationally bestselling Sex Lives series presents lighthearted accounts of the sexual escapades of major figures in history, politics, religion, the arts, and film. Irreverent and gossipy, the books are packed with carnal tidbits and eye-opening revelations. The headlines of...
The Rose of Martinique: A Life of Napoleon's Josephine
| Author | Andrea Stuart |
| ISBN | 0802142028 |
One of the most remarkable women of the modern era, Josephine Bonaparte was born Rose de Tasher on her family's sugar plantation in Martinique. She embodied all the characteristics of a true Creole-sensuality, vivacity, and willfulness. Using diaries and letters, Andrea Stuart expertly re-creates...
| Author | Wendy Moore |
| ISBN | 0307383369 |
Moore resurrects history from dry names and dates, and vividly recreates this eerily familiar era with a historian's love for detail and a storyteller's passion for a good yarn.
With the death of her fabulously wealthy coal magnate father when she was just eleven, Mary Eleanor Bowes became...
| Author | Christine Pevitt |
| ISBN | 0802140351 |
This biography of the legendary mistress of King Louis XV offers dramatic insight into the life of one of the most enchanting, powerful, and feared women to grace the world's stage. Groomed from an early age to assume the role of a rich man's mistress, Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson underwent several transformations...
A King's Story: The Memoirs of the Duke of Windsor
| Author | Edward Windsor |
| ISBN | 1853753033 |
Written in 1951, this is the autobiography of the late Duke of Windsor - great grandson of Queen Victoria, grandson of Edward VII, son of George V, and cousin of the German Emperor and the Czar of Russia. The book tells the story of the future king's early youth at Sandringham, his years at Naval School on...
