“Wow. C. E. Murphy is good. Court intrigue in an alternate Elizabethan-era fantasy world: realpolitik with the sex included.” –Kate Elliott, author of Crown of Stars In a world where religion has ripped apart the old order, Belinda Primrose is the queen’s secret weapon. The unacknowledged daughter of Lorraine, the first queen to sit on the Aulunian throne, Belinda has been trained as a spy since the age of twelve by her father, Lorraine’s lover and spymaster. Cunning and alluring, fluent in languages and able to take on any persona, Belinda can infiltrate the glittering courts of Echon where her mother’s enemies conspire. She can seduce at will and kill if she must. But Belinda’s spying takes a new twist when her witchlight appears. Now Belinda’s powers are unlike anything Lorraine could have imagined. They can turn an obedient daughter into a rival who understands that anything can be hers, including the wickedly sensual Javier, whose throne Lorraine both covets and fears. But Javier is also witchbreed, a man whose ability rivals Belinda’s own . . . and can be just as dangerous. Amid court intrigue and magic, loyalty and love can lead to more daring passions, as Belinda discovers that power is the ultimate aphrodisiac. “C. E. Murphy vividly reimagines Renaissance Europe as a world both familiar and strange. Filled with intrigue and betrayal, her story is a chess game with six of seven sides, and I look forward to seeing what the next moves are.” –Marie Brennan, author of Warrior and Witch From the Trade Paperback edition.

An exquisite sequel to "The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn", "Maxwell's second novel breathes extraordinary life into the scandals, political intrigue, and gut-wrenching battles that typified Queen Elizabeth's reign" ("Publishers Weekly").

“Wow. C. E. Murphy is good. Court intrigue in an alternate Elizabethan-era fantasy world: realpolitik with the sex included.” –Kate Elliott, author of Crown of Stars In a world where religion has ripped apart the old order, Belinda Primrose is the queen’s secret weapon. The unacknowledged daughter of Lorraine, the first queen to sit on the Aulunian throne, Belinda has been trained as a spy since the age of twelve by her father, Lorraine’s lover and spymaster. Cunning and alluring, fluent in languages and able to take on any persona, Belinda can infiltrate the glittering courts of Echon where her mother’s enemies conspire. She can seduce at will and kill if she must. But Belinda’s spying takes a new twist when her witchlight appears. Now Belinda’s powers are unlike anything Lorraine could have imagined. They can turn an obedient daughter into a rival who understands that anything can be hers, including the wickedly sensual Javier, whose throne Lorraine both covets and fears. But Javier is also witchbreed, a man whose ability rivals Belinda’s own . . . and can be just as dangerous. Amid court intrigue and magic, loyalty and love can lead to more daring passions, as Belinda discovers that power is the ultimate aphrodisiac. “C. E. Murphy vividly reimagines Renaissance Europe as a world both familiar and strange. Filled with intrigue and betrayal, her story is a chess game with six of seven sides, and I look forward to seeing what the next moves are.” –Marie Brennan, author of Warrior and Witch From the Trade Paperback edition.

An unadulterated look at "Bloody Mary"--Elder daughter of Henry VIII, Catholic zealot, and England's first and most murderous queen--argues that history has treated the much-maligned monarch unfairly.

The Bastard Queen: A Family Secret Revealed is a story of secrets, acceptance, and forgiveness. This is my life. A life I felt never needed to be written about because through my eyes was rather uneventful. I'd been awarded and achieved goals that not many people get to experience but chalked it up to luck and the hard work given to my vocal studies. Those moments have been documented in writing and photos for the history books. Child model, Homecoming Queen, featured guest artist on stage and television, Miss America, Broadway, etc. I had a gift in the field of the arts and mother tried to cultivate those talents. I know she sacrificed to give me those opportunities and for that I am appreciative. But what happens when the life you've lived becomes turned on its side, upside down, or does a dizzying full circle and you learn a secret has been kept from you? Was it out of love and to protect me? Was it to not bring shame upon the family? Was there ever an agreement to share the truth with me when I reached a certain age in adulthood? Mother never had the courage to tell me and she outlived ALMOST everyone who knew the truth. I feel she was ashamed and that late in life...what did it matter? Well, it matters to me. My children and my grandchildren deserve to know their history too. Dorothy Benham

Matilda of Flanders, queen to William the Conqueror was beautiful, exquisitely small, clever, with a perfect courtesy trained in the rigid school of medieval manners. But within lay a root of darkness - inheritance, perhaps, of Viking ancestors. Twice, at least, in her lifetime the Viking streak broke through, in vengeance on a faithless lover, in fury wreaked on a rival of the marriage bed. The marriage, though fruitful of so many children, was on her side no match of love. But a passionate loyalty to her husband, an equally passionate ambition, together with her own sense of justice, gave her the will and the skill to dissemble her feelings and to make her the praise of Christendom. No Queen ever wielded so much power as she in the long years she ruled Normandy; before her no woman in England was ever crowned or was known as Queen.

Now available in a new edition, the second book in Robin Maxwell's acclaimed Elizabethan quartet: "Powerfully lascivious intersections of sexual and international politics [combine] with Maxwell's electrifying prose . . . [to] make for enthralling historical fiction" (Publishers Weekly, starred review). Historians have long whispered that “the Virgin Queen” Elizabeth’s passionate, lifelong affair with Robin Dudley, Earl of Leicester, may have led to the birth of a son, Arthur Dudley. In this entertaining sequel to The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn, Robin Maxwell fashions a stunning fictional account of the child switched at birth by a lady-in-waiting who foresaw the deleterious political consequences of a royal bastard. Set against the sweeping, meticulously rendered backdrop of court intrigues, international scandals, and England’s battle against the Spanish Armada in 1588, Maxwell deftly juxtaposes Elizabeth and Leicester’s tumultuous relationship with the memoirs of the adventurous son lost to them—yet ultimately discovered. The Queen’s Bastard artfully weaves two tales, the first told by Arthur Dudley himself, who, exchanged at birth by Elizabeth’s intimates for a stillborn infant, grows up as a country gentleman, never knowing his true identity. A dreamer, a romantic, and a magnificent horseman, Arthur sets off to fight Philip II of Spain. Meanwhile, the lifelong love affair of Elizabeth and Leicester has only been strengthened by the presumed loss of their child. The two narratives collide when Arthur learns who his true parents are. Religion, sex, and the sixteenth century’s most fascinating personalities are woven into a rich tapestry of betrayal, the quest for power, and love.