The Confessions of Catherine de Medici by C.W. Gortner

This is the flesh-and-blood Catherine de Medici readers will meet in my book: the teenage Florentine heiress sent to France to marry a prince she does not love the determined wife enduring years in the shadow of her husband’s icy mistress the powerful regent fighting for her country the fierce mother with her brood of children and the bold queen whose alliance with an enigmatic rebel plunges her into a labyrinth of passion, betrayal, and murder. We forget that in the end, like all of us, she was human. Yet unlike Elizabeth I, who commands our respect with her virginal splendor or Mary of Scots, who elicits sympathy for her romantic martyrdom, Catherine has not been allowed much compassion. Catherine de Medici is a figure of lurid speculation but she had dreams and aspirations hopes and disillusions. When someone lives an eventful life in a tumultuous time, there’s always more to her story than history can tell us.

It is also dominated by the widowed queen-mother, Catherine de Medici. France found itself trapped between the tenets of the old faith and innovation of the new one-and the struggle that ensued is marked by its fervor and savagery. England, Germany, and the Low Countries embraced this new faith, while imperial Spain tenaciously combated the spread of what was seen as heresy. Obscured by her own dark legend, Catherine lurks in the shadows of history as the perennial black widow, weaving intrigue in her Louvre palace apartments even as outside her window, Paris lies bathed in blood.Ĭatherine was born in a time of deep religious conflict, when the idealism of Europe’s early Renaissance had given way to the zealous Protestant Reformation. Few queens are as notorious as this woman who ruled France during the 16th century, renowned for her ruthlessness and accused of heinous crimes, including the Massacre of St. Though I’d known about her for years, I soon discovered during my research how little I had truly understood her. I found Catherine de Medici to be both a perfect subject and enormous challenge for my next work of historical fiction.

Gortner on The Confessions of Catherine de Medici

The Confessions of Catherine de Medici by C.W. Gortner