Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Cinderella Has Left The Building

I don't know if anyone notices my "currently reading" feature, but for over a month, I've been working on a book called "Sex with Kings - Five Hundred Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry and Revenge" by Eleanor Herman. I expected a fun, frivolous and maybe a little bit naughty tale about palace romance and intrigue. What I got was a fantastic, incredibly well-researched, thoroughly depressing work of non-fiction.

Granted, I've always been a little bit naive, but even at the ripe old age of 41, I found it disappointing to discover that the idea of the prince marrying the princess and living happily ever after to be complete bunk. It turns out, for centuries, the prince (or king) was marrying the princess and giving up other women for the length of his honeymoon, maybe. In the French court there was even an title for the "official" mistress (there was more than one) "maitresse-en-titre".

Despite the cold dose of reality, I highly recommend this fascinating book.

1 comment:

Bossy Betty said...

Thanks! I will check it out.