Medicis Daughter ─ A Novel of Marguerite De Valois

Winter, 1564. Beautiful young Princess Margot is summoned to her mother's household, where her education begins in earnest. Known across Europe asMadame la Serpente, Catherine de Medicis is an intimidating and unmoving presence in France-a powerful force in a country recovering from the first of many devastating religious wars. Among the crafty nobility of the royal court, Margot learns the intriguing and unspoken rules she must live by to please her manipulative family.

Eager to be an obedient daughter, Margot accepts her role as a marriage pawn, even as she is charmed by the powerful, charismatic Duc de Guise. Though Margot's heart belongs to Guise, her hand will be offered to Henri of Navarre, a Huguenot leader and a notorious heretic looking to seal a tenuous truce. But the promised peace is a mirage: her mother's schemes are endless, and her brothers plot vengeance in the streets of Paris. When Margot's wedding devolves into the bloodshed of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, she will be forced to choose between her family and her soul.

Medicis Daughter is historical fiction at its finest, weaving a unique coming-of-age story and a forbidden love with one of the most dramatic and violent events in French history.

SOPHIE PERINOT is the author of The Sister Queens. She is a re-invented attorney. With a BA in History and a passion for reading, writing historical fiction seemed a natural second career. An active member of the Historical Novel Society, Sophie has attended all the group's North American Conferences, and served as a speaker on multiple panels. Other speaking engagements include being a presenting author at Baltimore Book Festival. When Sophie is not visiting corners of the past, she lives in Great Falls, Virginia, with her three children, three cats, one dog and one husband.