Anne and Charles: Passion and Politics in Late Medieval France

When Anne of Brittany’s father dies in 1488, the eleven-year-old beauty becomes Duchess of Brittany, her country’s ruler. For the next three years, the orphaned, unmarried young duchess is relentlessly pursued by suitors while Brittany is invaded by France, its larger, more powerful neighbor. With no other way out, at age fourteen she agrees to marry King Charles VIII of France, in order to save her country. Better to be a queen than a prisoner…

Unexpectedly, a passionate relationship ensues. Yet Charles cannot shake the bad habits he has brought into their marriage, and Anne cannot help him in his darkest area of struggle.

Together, they introduce the wonders of the Italian Renaissance to France, building one of Europe’s most glorious 15th-century courts at their royal residence in Amboise, in the heart of the Loire Valley.

But year after year they fail to achieve the most important aim they must accomplish in order to secure the future of their kingdom. As they desperately attempt to make their shared dream come true, an unexpected twist of fate irrevocably changes the fortunes of both Anne and Charles.

Anne & Charles is Book One of the Anne of Brittany Series, the tale of the only woman in history to be twice-crowned queen of France. Publishers Weekly says comparable titles are Philippa Gregory’s Plantagenet and Tudor Novels. (Booklife, April 23, 2018)