Mailbox Monday 03.28.11

Hosted this month by I'm Booking It.

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week (checked out library books don’t count, eBooks & audio books do). Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.

Woman is born free, and everywhere she is in corsets. . . .


Lili du Châtelet yearns to know more about her mother, the brilliant French mathematician Emilie. But the shrouded details of Emilie’s unconventional life—and her sudden death—are elusive. Caught between the confines of a convent upbringing and the intrigues of the Versailles court, Lili blossoms under the care of a Parisian salonnière as she absorbs the excitement of the Enlightenment, even as the scandalous shadow of her mother’s past haunts her and puts her on her own path of self-discovery.

Laurel Corona’s breathtaking new novel, set on the eve of the French Revolution, vividly illuminates the tensions of the times, and the dangerous dance between the need to conform and the desire to chart one’s own destiny and journey of the heart.

From Galley Grab. Release date: April 12th.

A glittering ball, a whisper of intrigue and a couple with secrets...

Regency London's most glamorous couple, Mélanie and Charles Fraser, have hidden their pasts from aristocratic society - and each other - to become the envy of the ton.

But, when attending a Twelfth night masquerade, a mysterious masked man is found stabbed to the heart; and all their misdeeds and secrets may be dragged into full, merciless light.

Mélanie's previous ties to the Empress Josephine - including a promise to her desperate daughter, Queen Hortense, and Charles's secret work for the British government - thrust them both into the search for the killer, taking them from Seven Dials to Mayfair, from viperous thieves' dens to candlelit ballrooms, where the glitter of diamonds can mask the gleam of the knife...

Bought.

The Tigress of Forli

Wife, mother, leader, warrior: Caterina Riario Sforza was one of the most prominent women in Renaissance Italy--and one of the most vilified. In this glittering biography, Elizabeth Lev re-examines her extraordinary life and accomplishments.

Raised in the court of Milan and wed at age ten to the Pope's corrupt nephew, Caterina was ensnared in Italy's political intrigues early in life. After turbulent years in Rome's papal court, she moved to the Romagnol province of Forli. Following her husband's assassination, she ruled Italy's crossroads with iron will, martial strength, political savvy--and an icon's fashion sense. In finally losing her lands to the Borgia family, she put up a resistance that inspired all of Europe and set the stage for her progeny--including Cosimo de Medici--to follow her example to greatness.

A rich evocation of Renaissance life, The Tigress of Forli reveals Caterina Riario Sforza as a brilliant and fearless ruler, and a tragic but unbowed figure.

From NetGalley. Release date: October 20th.