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Marie Antoinette and the French Revolution

Fiction

Abundance by Sena Jeter Naslund. A fictional tale of the life of Marie Antoinette presents the story of a teenage empress's daughter who is forced to leave her family home to marry the future king of France and who rebels against the formality and rigid protocol of court life.

Bluebird; or, The Invention of Happiness by Sheila Kohler. A tale based on the life of an eighteenth-century aristocrat finds Frenchwoman Lucy Dillon using her beauty and wit to gain entry into the circles of such luminaries as Talleyrand and Germaine de Sta?l and struggling to protect her family during the Revolution when her contemporaries, including Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, are executed.

Chevalier de Maison-Rouge by Alexandre Dumas. Written in collaboration with Auguste Maquet. Sequel to La Comtesse de Charny.

The Countess de Charny or, The Fall of the French Monarchy by Alexandre Dumas.  

The Diamond:  A Novel by Julie Baumgold.  A tale based on the history of the Râegent diamond is told from the perspectives of an exiled Napoleon and his biographer and traces the gem's discovery, journey through the courts of Europe, and ownership by Napoleon before his fall.

The English Heiress by Roberta Gellis.  In order to save Leonie De Conyers, his mistress, Roger St. Eyre, an English nobleman, becomes involved in the Royalist plot to free Marie Antoinette.

Farewell, My Queen by Chantal Thomas. Agathe-Sidonie Laborde, Marie Antoinette's reader, recounts her memories of living at Versailles during the final days of the French revolution.

The Frenchwoman by Jeanne Mackin.  As a seamstress in the court of Queen Marie Antoinette, Julienne marries a young officer who fought with Lafayette in America, and when he dies, she flees to Pennsylvania where Royalists try to recreate their lives in France.

Gardener to the King by Frederic Richaud. A novel about the obsessions of the two great rulers at the palace of Versailles describes how Louis XIV celebrates his armies' victory over Holland while his gardener, Jean-Baptiste de la Quintinie, works to make the gardens beautiful.

The Hidden Diary of Marie Antoinette by Carolly Erickson. Awaiting her execution, Marie Antoinette writes the story of her life, describing her privileged childhood as an Austrian archduchess, years as the glamorous mistress of Versailles, and imprisonment during the French Revolution.

Love and Terror by Alan Jolis.  When Marie Antoinette's lover Fersen hides her from revolutionary zealots, Joseph Fouch, one of Robespierre's henchmen, frantically searches for her.

Memoirs of a Physician by Alexandre Dumas.  The swindler Cagliostro, count of Alessandro, relates the decline of Louis XV's power in his memoirs.

The Prince Lost to Time by Ann Dukthas. Paris, 1815. Nicholas Segalla returns to France when the Dauphin, Louis Charles, 10-year-old son of Marie Antoinette is abducted.

The Queen's Confession by Victoria Holt.  Marie Antoinette reveals feelings of being a misunderstood queen.

The Queen's Necklace by Alexandre Dumas. Three members of the court of Louis XVI try to discredit Queen Marie Antoinette for adultery and theft, in the sequel to The Memoirs of a Physician.

Severance by Robert Olen Butler. Presents sixty-two stories, each exactly 240 words in length, that reveal the thoughts and feelings of individuals whose heads have been severed from their bodies, including such characters as Medusa, Anne Boleyn, a chicken, and a man decapitated on the job in 2008.

This Splendid Earth by V. J. Banis. When the vintner de Brussac family must flee after supporting the royalty during the French Revolution, its members take cuttings from the vineyard to California and build a wine empire.

Versaille by Kathryn Davis. Wittily entertaining and astonishingly wise, this novel of the life of Marie Antoinette finds the characters struggling to mind their step in the great ballroom of the world.

Nonfiction

Louis and Antoinette by Vincent Cronin. 944.035L92c

Marie Antoinette by Joan Haslip. 944.0350924M337h

Marie-Antoinette and Count Axel Fersen: The Untold Love Story by Evelyn Farr. 944. 0350922 F24a

Marie Antoinette: The Journey by Antonia Fraser. 944.035092 M337f

Marie Antoinette: The Last Queen of France by Evelyne Lever. 944.035092 M337l

Marie Antoinette: The Portrait of an Average Woman translated by Eden and Cedar Paul. 901M336z

Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution by Caroline Weber. 391.00944 W385q

The Road from Versailles: Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and the Fall of the French Monarchy by Munro Price. 944.0410922 P931r

A Scented Palace: The Secret History of Marie Antoinette's Perfumer by Elisabeth de Feydeau. 944.035092 F224f

Secrets of Marie Antoinette by Olivier Bernier. 944.0350924M337m

To the Scaffold: The Life of Marie Antoinette by Carolly Erickson. 944.035092 M337e

The Wicked Queen: The Origins of the Myth of Marie-Antoinette by Chantal Thomas. 944.035092 M337t

Related Lists

The Bastille and the Guillotine - the French Revolution in Fiction by Sarah Nesbitt from the Readers Advisory Databse NoveList.

Annotated descriptions of fiction titles provided by NoveList.