I’m not really caught up in the Jubilee excitement yet, which is a bit peculiar as I usually love that sort of thing. I’ve started eyeing up Jubilee mugs, tins and tea towels though so perhaps it’s just about to hit me and we’ll be buried beneath a landslide of commemorative ware by the end of the week.

One thing that I have bought is the latest Kate Williams book about the Queen, which like her earlier book Becoming Queen about the young Queen Victoria, focusses on the early life of Elizabeth II, arguing that it is the upbringing and youth of a monarch that determines what sort of ruler they will be become. I’m not sure that this is entirely true but it’s a nice theory and gives us an excuse for a really detailed look at the often ignored or skated over formative years of queenly figures.

Young Elizabeth: The Making of our Queen is, not entirely unexpectedly, an engrossing read and carries the reader from the childhood of the Queen’s awkward father Bertie through her childhood as the adored pet of the usually formidable George V and Queen Mary, on through her adolescence during the Second World War and then romance with the dashing naval officer Prince Philip to her glorious Coronation in 1953, giving us a potted social history of the country along the way from the often rather limited point of view of the Royal Family. It’s a fascinating tale of unrequited love, badly behaved Kings, revolution, war and dogs and although academic enough not to feel patronising, is also on the right side of gossipy so you don’t feel sullied by reading it. Don’t you find that you feel a bit grubby after reading some biographies of the Royal Family?

This isn’t whitewashed though – the pre-marital romantic interludes of both George VI and Prince Philip are dealt with in a matter of fact way and the relationship of Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson isn’t romanticised at all, with Wallis coming across as a rather nasty piece of work in this book. What is really touching though is the way that Williams discusses the romance of Princess Margaret and Peter Townsend – how very sad it must have been. There’s a mention too of Margaret creeping through the side doors of Buckingham Palace that made me laugh as my grandfather used to do guard duty there and at Clarence House and saw Elizabeth, Philip and Margaret all the time. He apparently saw Princess Margaret fall drunkenly out of a taxi on at least one occasion. She was superb.

Other anecdotes that I really enjoyed included the abdicated Edward VIII sitting by the radio listening to his brother’s Coronation in his place while calmly knitting a blue jumper for his Wallis; Prince Philip taking to the sofa at Treetops in despair when he heard the news of his wife’s accession to the throne and draping a copy of the Times over his face and Queen Mary’s unhappiness at having to return to London to ‘be Queen Mary again’ after her time in the countryside during World War Two. There are snippets like this all through the book, some of which are well known but others that were fairly new to me.

Above all though this book really brings to life the character of Elizabeth the young Queen and paints a touching and vivid picture of a serious, rather shy, good humoured and above all dutiful girl who adored animals and her family and felt betrayal (particularly that of her once favourite uncle David and then former governess Crawfie) very very keenly. Her careful and rather infantilising upbringing was a stark contrast to that enjoyed by her grandchildren now – her parents didn’t want her to appear too ‘intellectual’ (the opportunity to have an honorary degree from Cambridge was turned down as they didn’t want people to perceive her as a bit of a bluestocking) so her education was surprisingly rudimentary all things considered. She also shared a room with Princess Margaret and wore matching clothes until well into her teens and at an age when she ought to have been enjoying coming out balls was still considered part of the nursery.

I think this is underlined by the fact that she was fourteen when she made her famous address to the children of the Commonwealth in 1940, but sounds much much younger. ‘We know, everyone of us, that in the end all will be well; for God will care for us and give us victory and peace. And when peace comes, remember it will be for us, the children of today, to make the world of tomorrow a better and happier place. My sister is by my side and we are both going to say goodnight to you. Come on, Margaret. Goodnight, children. Goodnight, and good luck to you all.‘

Oh man, that makes me cry every time. I’m actually sitting here with a little tear snaking down my cheek. I can’t even begin to imagine how people at the time must have felt to hear that. When US soldiers came to the UK during the war they were instructed that under no circumstances whatsoever should they EVER say anything critical about the King, Queen and Princesses. Times have changed and not always for the best, but it can be hard in these cynical times to recall that there was a point when we absolutely and fervently adored our Royal Family. It’s amazing that when Elizabeth got engaged to Prince Philip, several thousand young women, many of whom were also brides to be, sent her some of their precious clothing rations to put towards her dress. They all had to be returned as transferring rations was illegal but even so, would we do that today? I’d like to think that we would.

I also love that amongst the couple’s splendid wedding gifts there was two burnt pieces of toast sent by a pair of sisters who burned their precious bread ration as they were so excited by the news of the royal engagement being announced on the radio and promptly sent the burned pieces with their congratulations to the palace.

Anyway, I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in the Queen and in particular her youth. It’s a great read.

One thing I will say though is that I read it on Kindle (downloaded from Amazon) and was really annoyed by how badly edited it was – it felt at times as if the Kindle version had been put together before any editing had even happened as there were occasional words, sentences and even, I believe, entire passages completely missing so I had to keep rereading paragraphs to try and make sense of them. There was also some pretty dodgy grammar – I know I take liberties here but you don’t pay to read this and I do most of it deliberately. I don’t blame the author at all for any of this but feel that her publisher has let her down a bit.

However, all this aside, I’d definitely still recommend this book.

Young Elizabeth the Making of Our Queen

Christ Church, Spitalfields.

So anyway, I went on the most amazing research trip to London last Friday. The plan was pretty simple – stay in the heart of my beloved Spitalfields and take photographs and notes to help me while writing The Ripper Novel which is a time slip book incorporating both 1888 and 2012 Whitechapel. This wasn’t a hardship at all as my family come from Whitechapel and I’ve been kicking about the place off and on for longer than I can remember, although when my grandparents moved us back from Scotland they opted to live in Essex rather than go back to the East End, alas. I still regard it as my cultural, spiritual and ancestral home though so it’s always nice to go back.

I arrived at lunchtime on the Friday, ditched my stuff at my hotel on Osborn Street, which is at the end of Brick Lane and a bustling thoroughfare lined with Turkish and Indian cafes and shops and then headed out for a wander around in the simmering heat. I took photographs of interesting graffiti and visited Ripper Site Number Two – busy and faintly insalubrious Hanbury Street, where Annie Chapman’s body was found in the backyard of number 29.

Hanbury Street.

After this I had a trip to All Saints where I tried on a profusion of dresses, all of which were too big and too long for me and then went to have lunch in Spitalfields Market before strolling down Brushfield Street and then along to Middlesex Street and Goulston Street, where the infamous ‘The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing‘ graffiti and a piece of Catherine Eddowes’ apron were discovered in a doorway.

I then walked on to Mitre Square, which was Ripper Site Number Four via Ripper Site Number Five, which is that pokey service road at the side of White’s Row car park which marks the former site of the notorious and long vanished Dorset Street. Miller’s Court, where Mary Jane Kelly’s body was discovered was on the left of the street but it’s all been pulled down now.

Mitre Passage.

I couldn’t quite remember where Mitre Square was at first as I usually go at dusk and all the sunlight was a bit discombobulating but then turned a corner and there was Mitre Passage in front of me looking as dark and eerie as always. I felt a distinct chill in the air as I walked down Mitre Passage and it even seemed a bit like all sound was muted as well. Due to the movements of the police that fateful night in 1888, we can be fairly sure that the Ripper made his escape down Mitre Passage after murdering Catherine Eddowes…

I lurked in Mitre Square for a while waiting for this tour group to go away. They’re clustered in the spot where Catherine Eddowes’ body was found. As a Ripperologist, I am in no position to complain about the interest other people may have in Jack the Ripper but I’m a bit bemused by daylight Ripper tours. It’s much better to go at night! Another group came in after this one and I was a bit perturbed to hear the guide coming out with all sorts of antiquated nonsense about the case. He was also in the habit of emitting hideous shrill eldritch screams. In broad day light! What must the people in the surrounding offices think?! One day, however, I will do a tour and IT WILL BE AWESOME.

Poor old Catherine Eddowes was found on approximately this spot.

The entrance to Mitre Passage from Mitre Square. The Ripper probably made his escape this way. Or did he?

I went back to Spitalfields after this, pausing at the Hummingbird Bakery for a restorative slice of vanilla cake before wandering through the market and then back along Brick Lane. I carried on along Old Montague Street until I reached Durward Street, which is Ripper Site Number One. Back in 1888, Durward Street was known as Bucks Row and it was here on the 31st of August 1888 that Polly Nichols’ body was discovered on the pavement by the old board school, which is the tall building in the photograph.

Entrance to Durward Street aka Bucks Row.

The old board school building, which was there in 1888 and loomed over the site where poor Polly’s body was found.

After this, I went back to my hotel to get ready for the evening and felt really at home and happy as I listened to the call to prayer floating over Spitalfields while putting on my makeup. I’d arranged to meet some friends in the Princess Alice on Commercial Street and had an ace evening drinking gin and being remarkably silly. There was a LOT of gossip involving misuse of disliked names, tiaras, inappropriate wearing of bridesmaids dresses and MORE about dreadful people and I even had a proposal of marriage! However, we have a rule that What Happens At Gin And Whores Stays At Gin And Whores so my lips are sealed. After the pub I went up Brick Lane for a curry with my friends Del and Miranda, which was great fun. People always tut a bit at me when I say that I never feel at all unsafe in Whitechapel but it’s true – I walked back to my hotel alone at 2am without any qualms at all.

The next morning I packed up my stuff and then went for a walk across Whitechapel High Street to Henriques Street, which is Ripper Site Number Three. Back in 1888, Henriques Street was known as Berner Street and it was here that Elizabeth Stride’s body was discovered on the night of the 30th September – the first of what is known as The Double Event Murders. To be honest I’m not even sure that she was one of the Ripper’s victims but that’s no reason to forget all about her as I believe all these women should be remembered. I just wish they’d got as much concern and attention in life as they did after death.

Approximate spot of the entrance to the yard where Elizabeth Stride’s body was found.

Henriques Street is a miserable little road but when you recall how bustling and busy Whitechapel High Street was back in the late Victorian era, you start to get a real appreciation for how flagrant the Ripper was. This is also true of Hanbury Street and Dorset Street – both were busy and well populated. Bucks Row and Mitre Square, however, were altogether lonelier.

After leaving Henriques Street I walked towards the City, unintentionally going past Mitre Square as I went. It’s not actually that great a distance but certainly not ‘a few streets away’. However, my feet automatically took me that way as I headed to the City so if Elizabeth Stride was also murdered by the Ripper, I couldn’t dispute that his route may also have taken him past Mitre Square.

It was a real eye opener to visit all of the Ripper sites again as it gives a real feel for the areas and also the distance between them. In popular imagining, the murders all took place within a very small area but actually they were fairly widely apart. It’s possible to walk between all five with ease but they aren’t a few streets away from each other either.

After all this, I walked through the deserted City (hardly anyone lives there so virtually everything closes down at the weekend) past the Gherkin and those lovely old City churches that stand serenely in the midst of glinting blue glass office buildings and relentless modernity and on to Austin Friars.

Not the greatest outfit for a sweltering summer’s day in the City: All Saints dress and Doc Marten boots!

As regular readers of this blog will know, I am a HUGE FAN of Wolf Hall and its sequel Bring Up The Bodies by Hilary Mantel and so I couldn’t resist a trip to see the site of Austin Friars, which was the main residence of Thomas Cromwell. Nothing now remains of the huge mansion complete with gardens and tennis courts that he built there for himself and his sprawling household but I think you can still get some sense of it. Austin Friars is a small quiet gated street tucked away in the streets in between London Wall and Old Broad Street. You have to concentrate very hard to imagine even the faintest essence of Thomas Cromwell in the air but what it does underline is the fact that he was very much a City Man with a residence that even in the sixteenth century was at the very heart of the old City and at the centre of the London financial world with its guilds, aldermen and banking houses.

I was extremely moved to stand on the site of Thomas Cromwell’s home, which is now the Drapers’ Hall at the end of Throgmorton Street and even wept a little tear for him. Or at least for the Cromwell that Mantel conjured up, whom I am madly in love with. In the pub the night before, I joked about falling through my own time slip and ending up in Tudor England where I would show Thomas Cromwell my iPhone and recommend that he tries Cut The Rope. Sadly, however, the sun shone and a slight breeze rose making the trees in the small gated garden rustle their green skirts enticingly but there were no sightings of long dead men.

I carried on through the city, past the Crutched Friars (Thomas Wyatt was given the Crutched Friars church after the Dissolution and apparently pulled it down to build a tennis court) and on to the London Wall where I ate a peaceful lunch in a pretty garden on one of the high walks leading to the Museum of London. My first London job after leaving university was in Moorgate and I always smile to myself a bit when I walk past what was my office, remembering the callow goth that I once was. Oh dear.

The London Wall is dotted with ruins from a long gone age.

I paid a quick visit to the Museum of London, conscious that I had a bus and train to catch back home to Bristol and wanted to have a last drink in the sunshine at Spitalfields Market before I went. I bought presents, including fab tea towels with eighteenth century ladies on them and books about the Great Fire for the Seven Year Old. In the museum itself I was particularly taken with this dress, which was worn by a little girl in honour of the Queen’s coronation in 1953. How lovely! I’m surprised no one has produced replicas.

SUCH a pretty dress!

Anyway, that was the end of my research visit. I’ll be back again once the Olympics have gone away as I glimpsed quite a few old pubs and winding alleyways that are just crying out for exploration. There was a wedding at Christ Church, Spitalfields on Saturday morning and the sound of bells really gladdened my heart as I made my way home.

One of the things that I love most about Bristol is its fine tradition of independent shops, restaurants and retailers. In fact the people of this fab city can get quite militant about maintaining independence on their local streets, which I think is pretty great.

Along with Pieminister, which I have visited in the past, I think that the Thali Cafe chain is one of the jewels in the Bristolian Crown of FOOD. There are four branches of the Thali Cafe in Bristol but their reach is actually much wider as, like Pieminister, they are staples on the British festival scene too so people from all over the country have sampled their thalis and aromatic sweet chai tea while sitting in a field at some point. Here in Bristol we’re lucky enough to be able to either visit one of their gorgeously bright and colourful restaurants or get a takeaway in one of their iconic tiffins.

For the uninitiated, a tiffin is an exciting metal Indian packed lunch container that the spouses of Indian workers pack with fabulous curries and rice – the metal keeping the meal warm for several hours. Customers of the Thali Cafe can buy a tiffin from them and then for about £8 get it refilled with three curries and enough rice for two. I send my husband out about once a week to the Totterdown branch with ours (which you can see at the top of this post!) to get our curry and I absolutely love it because a. it’s kind of fun, b. it’s cheaporama and c. it always makes me feel pretty healthy. Oh and d. it’s delicious.

The Thali Cafe team were kind enough last week to offer me a chance to try out their new lunchtime menu and so I very gladly trotted off on a gorgeous sunny day to their Easton branch to give it a whirl. I hadn’t been to Easton very often before but fell a bit in love as it is such a vibrant and diverse area, reminiscent of my beloved Spitalfields. It was the perfect day to laze in a beautiful hot pink Bollywood inspired restaurant and watch the world go by outside the wide windows.

To start we had poppadoms and a selection of interesting chutneys – tomato and tamarind (my favourite and seriously yummy, like a pungently spicy jam); yoghurt and ginger; mango, chilli and lime and mint raita. There was also salad and a selection of samosa, bonda and pakoras, all of which were fantastically tasty. To drink we had their own homemade lime drink (delicious!) and ginger beer (also delicious!).

After this our main courses arrived – as usual I picked a muttar paneer, which arrived with pilau rice and a large helping of salad while my husband had a Mogul chicken curry and the Three Year Old had a special fish and chips, which is described as ‘Masala fried fish with Bombay potato chips’.

My curry was delectable – creamy and not too spicy with plenty of paneer. I really love how at the Thali Cafe, salad is never just a mere garnish but an integral, delicious and important part of every meal.

We were intrigued by the Three Year Old’s Indian fish and chips, which is one of two child options on the menu, the other being a scaled down version of the usual adult thali with rice, lentil dhal and a choice of either fish, chicken or pakora. The fish and chips arrived on a traditional sectioned thali plate and comprised salad, sliced banana (which was eaten first as he is a FIEND for bananas), gorgeously spicy potato slices and what I am told was a perfect crispy but not too oily spicy battered fish.

I felt absolutely STUFFED after all this – it’s described as a ‘light lunch’ but thanks to a combination of scrumptuous, fresh tasting Indian food and all the sunshine I was starting to think longingly about going home for a really refreshing snooze on the sofa. However, we rallied a bit and ordered a kulfi to share between us. George, who looked after us, recommended the ‘choc-praline cluster’ and so we duly ordered one.

Oh my. Words cannot describe the heavenly deliciousness of this chocolate and praline kulfi, which becomingly arrived, bedecked with toasted coconut, in a glass jar. My husband, the lucky sod, doesn’t really have much of a sweet tooth but there was definite spoon clashing going on as we worked our way through the ice cream. The biggest fan of all though was, not entirely unexpectedly, the Three Year Old who sat like a plump little bird with his mouth wide open waiting to receive the sweet coconut riddled goodness and even, on occasion, swooped in to try and steal my portions. All in vain!

Anyway, we had the most superb time and will definitely be making a regular habit of visiting for lunch from now on as it was just the most lovely way to spend an afternoon. Thank you so much to George and all at the Thali Cafe for letting me come along! It was superb.

I’ve just had a pretty awesome couple of days in Bristol and the east end of London. I’ll be writing proper in depth posts about what I got up to but here’s a bit of a taster involving mojitos, Thomas Cromwell, Whitechapel, Jack the Ripper and delicious cake and curry!

Besides Rebecca Dean’s Wallis, I read The Secret Countess by Eva Ibbotson this week, which was a very light hearted and entertaining read. I imagined that all the characters looked like people from Downton Abbey, especially the Below Stairs characters. I finished Young Elizabeth: The Making of Our Queen by Kate Williams while in London, which is superb but yet again I got the impression that publishers put books on Kindle before they are edited as this was a bit of a mess with missing words, sentences and even at times entire passages; the odd bit of confusion (I don’t think I’ve ever seen the young Henry VII described as ‘jeunesse doré’ before and assume that actually it was meant to be Henry VIII) and so on. There were several points where I had to read a sentence several times over to work out what the hell it meant as there were split infinitive issues or the crux of the passage was seemingly completely missing. I don’t blame the author for this but am a bit insulted that the publisher thinks it’s okay to put out books in this sort of state. I’ll be doing a proper review in the next few days.

I’ve just started On Brick Lane by Rachel Lichtenstein, which is a look at the changing face of Brick Lane and the surrounding area in Spitalfields. I’m finding it fascinating so far. I stayed at a hotel on Osborn Street (which is at the end of Brick Lane) last night and listened to the call to prayer as I was getting ready to go out – I find it incredibly poignant and moving.

I’ve been reading a few more beauty blogs lately as I try to build up my make up collection again (I used to have a HUGE collection of MAC but the boys have laid waste to that) and also buy stuff for summer. My favourite new blogs are Harley Grant, who is one of the very few goth fashion type blogs that I have come across and seems to like all the same stuff as I do only it looks better on her and Cami Loves Kiwi, which I really like as she not only has wicked style but also has a fabulous writing voice.

And that’s pretty much all I have energy for right now! I’ll be posting more about the last few days and a review of the Kate Williams’ book over the next week!

As regular readers of this blog will perhaps recall I absolutely loved Rebecca Dean’s book The Golden Prince but was rather less keen on Palace Circle, despite really wanting to love it. I’m pleased to say though that her latest novel Wallis, which is a sort of follow up to The Golden Prince is a smasher and I pretty much gobbled it up.

Rebecca Dean was onto a winner though from the outset as Wallis, unsurprisingly as the clue is in the title, tells the story of the early life of Bessie Wallis Warfield and follows her through her really quite painfully unstable upbringing with her ‘flighty’ and impecunious mother; her subsequent abusive and really horrible first marriage to the handsome but really dreadful Win Spencer and then rather un-thrilling second one to nice but slightly dull Ernest Simpson. Now whatever people think about Wallis Simpson, and let’s face it she does tend to polarise opinion somewhat, one thing is for sure – she remains perennially fascinating and this novel brings her to life superbly.

As I’ve mentioned here before, I’m never sure what I think of Wallis but became much more sympathetic to her after reading Anne Sebba’s book That Woman, although I didn’t agree with some of the medical and psychological assessments that were made within its pages. I am very pleased therefore that Rebecca Dean’s novel also portrays a very sympathetic and likeable Wallis that I think is fairly true to life. She’s not perfect by any means but definitely not the ruthless, hard hearted socialite of popular imagining. What comes across is a courageous, fun loving, warm hearted, vibrant but also desperately insecure and rather snobbish young woman who hides her battered heart beneath a brittle veneer of chatter and bold faced bravado. I rather loved her.

The main crux of the book is an imagined friendship between Wallis and a fictional Duke’s daughter, Pamela who for some unknown reason is living in Baltimore. The girls remain best friends through childhood and adolescence before going their separate ways and it is their friendship and the betrayal that temporarily brings it to an end that is the main catalyst of everything that happens within the novel. I found this a bit disconcerting as the fascinating Pamela is a fictional character but it works really well and I’m guessing she is based on a composite of real people. If you like your historical fiction to strictly adhere to the facts then you may find Pamela and her husband highly annoying distractions. I liked them though and hope they get their own novel or that they feature in a follow up to Wallis, which I hope is forthcoming as it ended all too soon for me.

I also really liked that the fabulous Houghton sisters who were the stars of The Golden Prince featured in this book so I could catch up with them all again. I do love it when writers do this – it’s always a thrill when Heyer’s characters pop up in her other books, although I lament that her allegedly planned Lord Wrotham novel never happened.

Anyway, yes, if you are fascinated even slightly by Wallis Simpson or have a thing for the glitz and glamour of the early 19th century then I’d definitely recommend Wallis. I’ve now moved on to Kate Williams’ new biography Young Elizabeth: The Making of our Queen, which will no doubt talk about Wallis from an entirely different perspective and probably make me cross with her all over again…

Further reading:

Wallis

The Golden Prince

Palace Circle

That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor

Young Elizabeth: The Making of our Queen

Unbound is a really intriguing concept whereby writers can pitch projects to the public and amass paying supporters to fund it. This is a really great throwback to the days when wealthy subscribers would fund books, although nowadays you don’t have to be wealthy as Unbound support starts at £10 and goes up to £1,000, with the supporters getting increased amounts of benefits in return for their cash.

I’m really excited that one of the current Unbound projects is Ade Teal’s raucous, colourful and florid GIN LANE GAZETTE, about which he says: ‘Many of us think of the ill-behaved celebrity and the tabloid splash as inventions of the modern world, but the antics of Premiership footballers and C-list soap stars are as nothing when set alongside the peccadilloes and hell-raising of 18th-century celebs.

The GIN LANE GAZETTE will be a compendium of illustrated ‘best bits’ from a fictional newspaper of the latter 1700s. It will contain some of the most sensational headlines and true stories of the period. The presses will be presided over by inky-fingered hack Mr. Nathaniel Crowquill, the editor and proprietor, whose premises are located in Hogarth’s chaotic Gin Lane, and who has devoted fifty years to sniffing out scandal and intrigue. His drunken acolyte, Mr. Jakes, supplies merciless caricatures and engravings for every page. Sports reports, obituaries, fashion news, courtesans of the month, book reviews, and advertisements for bizarre – and often alarming – goods, services and entertainments will also feature in a riotous mélange of metropolitan mayhem.‘

Sounds brilliant, doesn’t it?

I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to interview the very charming Mr Teal about his work, inspiring Georgians, tattooed buttocks, The Baboon Incident and snogging Kitty Fisher for this here blog…

1. What first sparked your interest in the 18th century?

I saw one of the many Hollywood versions of the mutiny on the Bounty story in the early 1990s, and became vaguely curious about how much the historical reality differed from the cinematic myth-making. I became hooked on the Bounty very quickly, and was increasingly frustrated by the lack of a contemporary portrait of the chief mutineer, Fletcher Christian, so I spent three years researching family resemblance in portraits of his closest relations, finding physical descriptions of the chap, and studying hairstyles and unifoms of the period. I hired an anatomically-trained portraitist to paint a likeness based on all this, and it ended up in a biography by Fletcher’s direct descendant, Glynn Christian. You’ll see it crop up in articles and documentaries now and again. This was my slightly odd route into the 1700s.

2. Are you planning any more books similar to GIN LANE in the future?

Yes. Kind of. There is talk of a collaboration, with an eminent historian of the more depraved aspects of the Georgian period, about which I can say NOTHING.

3. That sounds intriguing but I won’t pester for more information! Who is your favourite Georgian?

Charles James Fox. He is the 18th century made flesh. He drank, gambled away an absolute fortune, womanised, shared mistresses with the Prince of Wales, married a courtesan in secret for love, and fought a duel with a political opponent. Ed Miliband – take note.

4. Ah, I love Charles James Fox too. If you could actually go back to Georgian times – would you?

If it were for a limited period – six months, say – then yes. If I found myself requiring any sort of medical assistance, I think I’d be looking for the escape button next to the time-portal pretty damned quickly.

5. Kitty Fisher, Georgiana of Devonshire and Perdita Robinson – which one would you snog/marry/avoid?

Snog Kitty Fisher, because she was a good laugh, by all accounts. Marry Perdita, because she was beautiful beyond words, intelligent, bookish, and her heart was in the right place, I think. Avoid Georgiana – she’s trouble, that one. I enjoyed Foreman’s biography, but I didn’t warm to her as a character one iota. A spoilt madam.

6. Oh, Kitty Fisher! Who WOULDN’T?! Anyway, who would win in a fight between the cast of The Only Way Is Essex and the members of the Hellfire Club?

Probably the TOWIE folk. Dashwood’s boys would make a good fist of it, but they’d be let down by the Earl of Sandwich. He was a big girl’s blouse. He’s involved in a baboon incident in the Gin Lane Gazette, which is very revealing.

7. There’s a wonderfully Rowlandson like quality to your work – a kind of florid raucousness and irreverence. Has he always been an inspiration to your drawing?

My main inspiration is Gillray. He was outstanding. He invented the modern political caricature almost single-handedly, and we haven’t really moved on as cartoonists since. He was merciless and hated everybody. Someone once described him as ‘a caterpillar on the leaf of reputation’.

8. If you could go back in time, not just to the 18th century, and draw anyone at all – who would you pick and why?

Fletcher Christian (see above). I’d want to see how close we got to a true likeness. He had tattooed buttocks, incidentally. I wouldn’t be too fussed about sketching those, though, to be honest.

9. What is your absolute favourite tale of scandal, woe and posh doom from the Georgian period?

The one I always tell when I’m explaining the book is about Juliana Popjoy, mistress to Master of Ceremonies at Bath, Beau Nash, who was so distraught when he died that she lived for the rest of her days in a hollowed-out tree. Everything in the 1700s was done with commitment and panache. We always see headlines on the cover of glossies where a C-list celeb ‘Tells Of Her Pain’. However much pain they claim to be in, they don’t go and live in a tree. Juliana was known in Bath as ‘Betty Besom’, because she used to gallop about on a horse which she propelled with a many-thonged, besom-like whip.

10. Crikey. Can you imagine the Daily Mail if Jennifer Aniston had gone to live in a tree after being ditched by Brad Pitt? Lawks! Anyway, are you going to dress up for the launch party?

Yes. No. Maybe. We might make it ‘fancy dress optional’. I’m hoping two lady Twitter chums, starting a 1700s-themed business, are going to turn up in all their Georgian finery. Watch this space.

Thanks so much Ade for your entertaining answers! I honestly CANNOT WAIT to find out what happened with the Earl of Sandwich and the baboon.

You can find out more about the GIN LANE project and also lend your support here. It starts from £10, which will get your name in the back of the book, access to the virtual ‘author’s shed’ and an e-book edition of the completed work. A £20 pledge will get you all this and a hardcover copy and so on. I’m SERIOUSLY MIFFED that I can’t afford the £250 pledge, which entails a GEORGIAN PUB CRAWL, tickets to the launch party where Ade Teal may or may not be dressed up in Georgian finery and a caricature of myself as a Georgian aristocrat. A GEORGIAN PUB CRAWL. Wow.

Thanks again to Ade and GOOD LUCK with the book!

I didn’t do very well at sticking to Book Review Sunday so instead I am introducing Weekly Roundup At Some Point Over The Weekend or something. I’ll have to think of a more snappy title by the end of this post, won’t I?

Anyway, I used to really enjoy writing about the various things that I’d got up to during the week and lots of you seemed to like reading about it for whatever reason so I am BRINGING IT BACK. I know, I’m so good to you.

Anyway, the lovely photo montage above shows you some of what I’ve been up to this week besides seeing the family team West Ham getting back into the Premier League. I’m ECSTATIC about this and am determined to get to Upton Park for a match next season. I mean it! My family have been Hammers fans since way back when – in fact, when my great grandmother died, the team sent a wreath to her funeral.

Anyway, what are all those pictures, I hear you cry. Well, I’ll tell you now from the top left to bottom right.

1. My spanky new ‘peacock glitter’ star hairband from Janine Basil. I’m in love with it and can’t wait to wear it to the pub in Whitechapel with my friends next weekend!

2. I couldn’t resist this acrylic ‘GOTH’ necklace. I know that I keep saying that I’m not a goth but as all members of Goth Club know, the first rule of Goth Club is ‘DENIAL’. We don’t like to talk about the second rule…

3. My current reading – my old copy of The Winter Queen by Carola Oman. This is essential reading for all fans of the Palatine family.

4. My hair at the moment. It needs re-doing.

5. My new Doctor Martens Darcie boots. I haven’t bought myself a pair of Docs since my teens when I used to get them for a tenner a pair from a shop in Colchester so this was a bit exciting! I’m in LOVE.

6. The Seven Year Old at Krispy Kreme. He looks pretty happy!

7. My new Irregular Choice shoes. How pretty?!

8. I am struggling with a bit of an addiction to Illamasqua make up at the moment. This week’s booty was bright pinky red lipsticks in Salacious and Drench as well as an Android pigment. I also succumbed to NARS Strada eyeshadow and Funny Face lipstick.

9. Not so saucy Jack. I finally transformed our spare room into my office and this picture takes pride of place along with a map of Whitechapel in 1890s and a LOT of books and pretty whimsy.

10. More pictures from my office – a print of Marie Antoinette and a photograph of me taken in Whitby many years ago. Yes, that’s me. Look how long my hair was!

11. My beloved Thali Cafe tiffin! My grandfather bought me this for my last birthday and it’s one of my most prized possessions – basically I send my husband out to the local Thali Cafe branch with this and they fill it up with different curries and enough rice for two for about £8. I think it’s ace and pity anyone who doesn’t have one.

12. Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows came out this week. Hurray! My husband bought me the blu-ray as he knows I love watching film commentaries. I used to feel embarrassed about that but lots of people do, don’t they?

I’ve spent the week writing like a demon, which is fun for no one as it makes me grumpy. I’m on an extended and possibly permanent sabbatical from my day job while I finish this book and it’s taking some getting used to.

I’ve been reading a fair amount too – as well as Bring up the Bodies, I also read Dracula in Love by Karen Essex last week, which was really good and really spun the whole Dracula story around on its head leaving the reader initially uncertain about who the villains and heroes of the piece actually are. It’s very goth and dark and sensual although I think I did it a mild disservice by reading it when the weather was sunny – it’s really a book to be savoured on rainy windswept autumn and winter nights.

I also completely adored this guest post on the awesome Bad Reputation blog, where the writer decided which five women from history she would rescue and bring to the modern day if she had a time machine to whisk them away in. I loved this idea SO MUCH.

You should all check Bad Rep out anyway to be honest. It’s funny as I have been secretly reading and admiring it for ages and ages but dared not say anything as the editor used to go out with one of my ex boyfriends and I was under the impression that she hated my guts. However! This turned out to be a pack of nonsense and we are BLOCK CAPITAL, THOMAS CROMWELL AND GLITTER LOVING BUDDIES now and EVERYTHING. Oh yes.

I think that it’s all I have to say about this week to be honest so I will leave you with what appears to be the week’s most played song on my iTunes account and scamper off to weep over this chapter.

I know I’ve posted Before I’m Dead by Kidney Thieves before but I love it so you’ll have to put up with it again. I also love this peculiar fan made video. It works quite well, doesn’t it? There’s not enough Stuart Townsend as Lestat though for my taste. Is there EVER though?

I didn’t manage to think of a good title so I’m just going to go with my current ear worm. COME ON YOU HAMMERS.

Poor old Anne Boleyn. She lost the game and on this day, four hundred and seventy six years ago, she paid the price.

Here’s a picture of me looking suitably mournful beside the plaque commemorating what they used to think was the site of the scaffold on Tower Green. I’m the one with red hair and clashing pink frock. My cousin is sitting beside me pretending to cry because she is a. pathetic, b. an inveterate drama queen even at a young age and c. highly competitive. She didn’t actually know who Anne Boleyn was and probably still doesn’t. I know, right? Get me, being all snarky at this time in the morning.

I have a photograph somewhere of me wearing the rather natty Anne Boleyn costume that my grandmother made for me when I was about eight years old. I would insist upon wearing it to school every day for a very long time. It’s not really surprising that I got terribly bullied is it…

The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn: The Most Happy

Don’t be like my cousin – if you’re sitting there thinking ‘I’d really like to know more about Anne Boleyn’ then I’d wholeheartedly recommend this book as it is simply the best book about Anne Boleyn ever written.

I honestly love writing about Elizabeth of Bohemia and her children and am seriously considering writing a novel just about her when I’ve finished this current book about Henrietta Stuart and the Ripper Novel Of Doom. I have a massive list of books that I want to write though so we shall see.

Today’s tale of seventeenth century romance and shenanigans is brought to you by one of Elizabeth’s sons – allegedly the handsomest and most charming of all. Yes, that’s right, he was even better looking than the rather ridiculously lovely Prince Rupert.

According to embassy despatches to his uncle Charles I, Prince Edward of the Palatine was born at the Hague palace on the 6th of October 1625 to Elizabeth Stuart and her husband Frederick, Elector Palatine. He was their fifth surviving son (another had died in infancy but on the whole the Palatine brood was remarkably healthy – with only three of Elizabeth and Frederick’s thirteen children dying in early childhood) after Henry, Carl, Rupert and Maurice.

The young prince Edward, known as Ed within his rambunctious family, was a charming, high spirited but good natured boy who was not quite so difficult and quarrelsome as his elder brothers Rupert and Maurice. Nonetheless in around 1638, his mother, fatigued by the brawling and occasionally scandalously bad behaviour of her younger sons decided to pack Maurice, Edward and their younger brother Philip off to Paris for a couple of years to learn some manners and how to conduct themselves as gentlemen.

It doesn’t appear to have had much effect on Maurice, who would later become a privateer after the end of the civil war or Philip, who would kill a man in a duel and be forced to flee his homeland but Edward seems to have embraced the Parisian lifestyle wholeheartedly – so much so that aged twenty, he returned to Paris in 1645, converted to Catholicism and secretly married the daughter of the Duc de Nevers.

His new bride, Anne de Gonzague was nine years older than him, blonde, witty in an indolent sort of way and absolutely infatuated with this ridiculously handsome but penniless young prince. Luckily she was as fabulously wealthy as he was church mouse poor and so the couple, who were known at the court of Louis XIV as the Prince and Princesse Palatine lived it up in high style after their marriage. Anne is an intriguing character – it appears that she was intended from an early age to become a nun but instead rebelled against this and fell madly in love with her cousin, the Duc de Guise who had also been destined for a religious career and had in fact been Archbishop of Rheims at one point before having to ditch this in order to succeed his father and elder brother to the dukedom.

It’s believed that Anne and the Duc de Guise married in secret in 1639 and she subsequently disguised herself as a man in order to travel with him. Certainly the two were well known to be having some sort of liaison, either legally or otherwise. Whatever happened, it all went awry in 1641 and the pair went their separate ways, leaving Anne free to marry her handsome prince four years later, apparently untroubled by the continued existence and rude health of what was rumoured to be her first husband.

Her new husband’s formidable and very Protestant mother was predictably FURIOUS when she heard not just about her son’s conversion to Catholicism but also his precipitous marriage to a bride not of her choosing. Her children may have been rapidly gaining a name for themselves throughout Europe as brilliant, independent, hot headed and unconventional eccentrics but this was Going Too Far in Elizabeth’s book and she announced in high dudgeon that she wished that he was dead.

However, to quote her best beloved Shakespeare, all’s well that ends well and in time Elizabeth and her son were reconciled – partially because he seems to have been just too darned charming to remain angry with for very long; partially because unlike the rest of her sons he never ever asked her for money and also because unlike the rest of their children at that point he very obligingly provided her at regular intervals with three pretty little granddaughters. We know that he and his wife visited Elizabeth at the Hague at least once and that she commissioned portraits of them both by Honthorst to hang alongside the rest of her family portraits there. We also have accounts of Edward very cheerfully going on shopping trips around Paris for his mother, acquiring all the most modish and fanciful trinkets for her delight.

Edward was to die in March 1663 after which Anne renounced her previously giddy and somewhat dissipated lifestyle and became really quite devout, in the manner of rather a lot of noblewomen of the time – devoting herself to good works and marrying her daughters off to suitably well connected gentlemen. In the scramble to secure the succession after the end of the Stuart dynasty, the daughters of Edward and Anne were better placed to succeed than the children of his younger sister Sophia but were unable to act on their superior claim and save us from the pudding faced Hanoverians due to the fact that Catholics are barred from the succession.

Their eldest daughter, Louise Marie was married in 1670 to the Prince of Salm. The second girl, Anne Henriette Julie, pictured above in a gorgeous portrait by my beloved and under appreciated Gobert, made the most splendid match of all when she married the Prince de Condé in 1663 and Bénédicte Henriette, the youngest of Edward and Anne’s daughters married the Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg in 1668 and was mother of Wilhelmine Amalia of Brunswick-Lüneburg, who would marry the Holy Roman Emperor Joseph I in 1699.

Further reading:

The Winter Queen: Elizabeth Of Bohemia (Women in History (Sterling))

My novel about Marie Antoinette, The Secret Diary of a Princess seems to have attracted a really nice faction of fans (hello!) and I get emails and comments pretty much every day asking if there will be a sequel. I’m not sure if there will be any more as I have so many other projects on the go but as today is the 242nd anniversary of their wedding day (what stone is that? Kryptonite?), I thought I’d let you see what happens next.

The novel ended with Marie Antoinette and the Dauphin poised to enter the chapel for their wedding. Some reviewers have complained about this as they thought it too abrupt, but I thought it was the perfect place to leave them – poised on the brink of history as it were. This should hopefully please those readers.

Wednesday 16th May 1770, Versailles.

It didn’t take us long to reach the royal chapel and there was a small awkward pause as my ladies hurried forward to tweak my full skirts and, clicking their tongues disapprovingly against their teeth, do their best to hide the wide expanse of lacing at my back, which reveals that my beautiful cloth of silver dress, made from measurements carefully sent from Vienna several months earlier, was now far too small for me.

They tried not to show how irritated they were but I could tell by the way that they sharply tugged and pulled the laces and briskly turned me this way and that, that they were annoyed with me for having had the temerity to grow and show them all up.

‘Good luck,’ Jeanne de Mailly whispered when the ladies in waiting finally melted away, their wide silk and brocade skirts rustling against the cold marble floor. ‘You look beautiful. Look straight ahead and ignore all the staring.’ She gave my hand a quick surreptitious squeeze. ‘You’ll be fine.’

I turned and smiled reassuringly at the Dauphin, who was standing mutely beside me in his diamond and sapphire spangled coat which I am told cost more than my entire wedding ensemble, his pale eyes wide with terror while a pulse beat time in the vein at his temple. Now that I had overcome my own fears, I wished that there was some way that I could bring the colour back into his pale cheeks and stop him trembling. ‘It will be over soon,’ is the lame best that I could manage as he hesitantly took my hand and we stepped forward together into the luminous white and gold light of the chapel.

Ever since I was a little girl I have dreamed of the perfect wedding, complete with a gorgeous dress, handsome prince and all of my family smiling fondly as they watched me sail gracefully up the long crimson carpeted aisle towards the altar. Mama would proudly wipe tears of joy from her eyes and my brother Joseph, tall and handsome in blue watered silk would be waiting to give me away to my new husband, who’d watch me lovingly as I made my way up the aisle. Even though I knew that it was all impossible, that such a wedding could never happen, I’ve still clung to that dream no matter what and in the end, the reality wasn’t all that bad in comparison.

True, my beautiful dress didn’t fit properly; my prince although fair, isn’t exactly handsome and my family were all thousands of miles away but nothing could have prepared me for the breathtaking spectacle of the columned gilt and white marble chapel at Versailles in all its wedding day splendour. The bright spring sunlight shone through the tall windows, sending bright shards of coloured light floating over the assembled congregation while overhead there soared a beautiful painted ceiling which depicts scantily clad angels cavorting against a pure azure blue sky.

Everywhere I looked there were flowers – huge fragrant armfuls of white and yellow lilies, roses and peonies were arranged in vast porcelain vases at the end of each pew and in between the windows while the most enormous displays of all were reserved for either side of the cloth of gold covered altar.

Everyone turned to stare at us as we went past and despite Jeanne’s advice to look straight ahead and pretend not to see them, I couldn’t help letting my eyes nervously slide from side to side, taking in their painted unsmiling faces, the dazzling jewels that glittered like cold fire in the sunlight, the heavily perfumed coloured silks and brocades worn by both men and women. ‘I have come to live among you,’ I wanted to say to them. ‘I want you all to love me.’

Ahead, I could see the tall Duc de Chartres beside his pretty wife who hides a razor sharp tongue beneath a silly, frivolous exterior. Her flounced and lace trimmed dress of primrose yellow silk spangled with diamonds was the very height of fashion and as I drew nearer I saw that she had yellow roses and sapphire stars pinned into her powdered hair. Beside her stood the pretty Princesse de Lamballe, demure in cream satin and pearls and with pink peonies tucked into her cloud of fair hair, who smiled at me shyly and raised her hand in greeting as I drew level.
I longed to smile back, to throw my arms around her and weep with the relief of having someone on my side amongst this sea of unfriendly faces but instead I merely inclined my head and carried on, keeping my happiness to myself. I have a friend here, I thought. Only one but it’s a start.

We were in front of the altar now and the Archbishop of Rheims stepped forward in his opulent cloth of gold robes embroidered with roses, the lilies of France and suns to conduct the service. As he began to speak, I risked a quick look back over my shoulder to the crimson velvet hung balcony high above where the King, standing alone in magnificent solitude, watched the ceremony. I risked a small smile and in return was rewarded with the tiniest of winks and a proud nod. Two friends, I thought.

The Archbishop has the most unfortunate stammer and I longed to catch the Dauphin’s eye and share a smile as he struggled manfully with my name: Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna. He stared resolutely straight ahead though and although there is something about him, a shyness and earnestness of manner, that reminds me of my younger brothers, I do not feel like I have his measure quite enough yet to share anything so intimate as a joke.

Instead, I hopped from side to side, trying to ease the aching of my feet in their high heeled diamond studded shoes which pinched my toes and thought about my family far away in Vienna. On the day of my proxy wedding to the Dauphin, which took place back in April, I wondered about this boy now at my side and tried to imagine how he must be feeling, knowing that in Austria an unknown young girl was in the process of becoming his bride. Now, with him beside me, I thought about my family and hoped that they were wishing me well. They would be, of course. I could picture them easily, sitting around a table in Mama’s apartments in the Hofburg and toasting each other with wine as Joseph grinned and said: ‘At this very moment, our little Antonia is becoming Dauphine of France. Thank God that after all these years, it has finally all gone to plan. I might even get some sleep tonight.’

The Dauphin gave a discreet little cough beside me and with a start, I realised that we had reached a point in the ceremony where we were expected to kneel on the two red velvet cushions that had been placed in front of the altar. Two angel faced altar boys stepped forward in their snowy white robes and began to swing sweetly scented incense over our heads as the Archbishop, really getting into his stride now, raised his voice and began to intone in the most dramatic way.

Behind me I could hear the bored whispers, coughs and occasional muted giggles of the congregation and if I concentrated harder, I could even hear the swishing of the ladies’ silk dresses and creaking of their stays as they fidgeted impatiently, dropping their leather bound prayer books onto the marble floor and clicking the ivory and wooden sticks of their painted and gilded fans between their fingers.

After what seemed like forever we stood again and blushing and sweating nervously the Dauphin took my hand in his and pushed a ring which he almost dropped in his haste to get the task over and done with, onto my finger, while muttering: ‘Marie Antoinette, take this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity. In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.’

A dark haired page boy then stepped forward with a white satin cushion upon which rested a second ring which has been blessed by the Archbishop along with thirteen gold coins, which represented my purchase from my family. I picked it up and, looking him squarely in the eye, I put it onto the Dauphin’s outstretched finger, clearly saying: ‘Louis Auguste, take this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity…’ I was determined not to show the slightest sign of fear in front of these people and I smiled to myself, imagining them all sitting up straight and looking around in consternation as my young voice soared clear and high above them.

The Mass and communion, which we took while standing beneath a silver spangled canopy held by four gentlemen of the court, followed shortly after that and then a great gasping sigh of relief rippled through the chapel as the choir began to sing and we turned to make our way back out again. As we slowly passed beneath the royal balcony, I looked up and smiled at the King then blushed when he bowed and kissed his bejewelled fingers to me.

‘That went well,’ the Dauphin remarked as we reached the doors and found ourselves in the cool marble vestibule again.

‘Did you notice the stammering?’ I said, laughing and turning to my ladies in waiting to share the joke. ‘Jose-pha-pha-pha.’

Everyone else laughed, pleased to lighten the mood and share the relief that the ceremony had gone without hitch but the Dauphin just looked at me reprovingly. ‘The Archbishop is a good man and you ought not to mock him,’ he said stiffly before going red and turning away as I stared at him in astonishment.

There was an awkward silence during which my ladies in waiting looked at us both open mouthed in mingled shock and amusement. I can just imagine the gossip that will flow like water in the salons of Versailles and Paris this evening. ‘Well,’ I said at last, with a forced jocularity. ‘I must say that I feel suitably reprimanded.’ I was seething inside though. Seething. If one of my brothers spoke to me like that, I would tip a drink over his head. Or pull his hair. I briefly considered pulling the Dauphin’s hair, which peeps dark blond and thick from beneath his powdered wig but then regretfully decided against it.

‘Your Highness?’ Jeanne was at my side, her pretty face carefully blank. ‘The King will be waiting upstairs for you to come and sign the register.’ The formality of her manner brought me to my senses and reminded me that we were being watched by thousands of people, all crammed into every nook and cranny of the palace’s public rooms in order to watch us pass by. If I wasn’t careful, reports of my row with the Dauphin would be landing on my mother’s desk within a matter of days and I’d have a delightfully reproving letter to look forward to. Never mind Paris, it is Vienna’s disapproval that I need to avoid at all costs.

‘Of course.’ I longed to stick my nose in the air and sweep straight past my new husband, leaving him all alone in the vestibule to reflect upon the error of his ways but instead I waited for him to give me his hand and then stiffly walked beside him back up the stairs to the reception rooms above while the crowd pressed close and followed behind. I unbent enough to whisper: ‘I don’t think I will ever be able to find my way around Versailles.’

Louis didn’t even look at me. ‘You’ll soon get to grips with it,’ he said without interest.
We retraced our steps through the magnificent series of reception rooms overlooking the gardens and then swept around to the magnificent, luminous Hall of Mirrors again, which was once again crammed with thousands of people, including most of the congregation at the wedding who must have gathered up their heavy skirts and sprinted ahead of us so that they could jostle their way into the best positions in front of the dozens of orange trees that stand between the tall windows, their sweet ripe scent filling the hall and almost masking the rather less pleasant odour of dozens of unwashed bodies crammed together in a small space on a warm spring day.

A pair of footmen in navy blue and red livery swung open the mirrored doors that lead to the King’s council room and the Dauphin took me inside. The entire royal family had gathered there to greet us and as we stepped into the room, they politely applauded us with every appearance of genuine pleasure in our union while King Louis himself stepped forward with open arms to welcome me. ‘You did very well, my dear,’ he murmured, kissing my cheeks, enveloping me with his rich scent of musk and amber then leading me to the large table in the centre of the room where the parish register book had been carefully placed with a large golden ink well and fresh white feather pen beside it.

The King signed first, his signature a tall and elegantly confident underlined ‘Louis’, before handing the pen to his grandson who produced a cramped and off kilter ‘Louis Auguste’. It’s my turn next and I dipped the pen into the ink then proceeded to carefully sign my name. All goes well through the unfamiliar loops and fuss of ‘Marie Antoinette’ but then disaster struck at the beginning of ‘Josephe’ when the pen blurted out an immense splodge of rose scented ink onto the otherwise pristine page.

My cheeks went hot with embarrassment as I heard the Duchesse de Chartres snigger behind me but then my husband whispered: ‘Don’t worry, just carry on’ and so I did, completing ‘Jeanne’ with a triumphant flourish and stepping aside with much relief as one by one the rest of the family – my new brothers and sisters in law, my husband’s trio of middle aged aunts and the Chartres couple stepped up to sign their names after mine.

After this we accepted everyone’s congratulations again and I found myself wondering more and more about the tall unhappy looking boy who stood so silently at my side, not saying a word and clearly wishing that he could be somewhere else. But where?

The sunshine didn’t last forever and shortly after I had returned to my apartments for a brief rest and another abortive attempt to tighten the lacing on my gown as I held onto my bedposts and the maids tugged with all their might behind me, the heavens opened and rain began to first splatter and then slam alarmingly against the thin window panes in my bedchamber. ‘It’s not a proper wedding without a bit of rain!’ Jeanne announced gaily as I pouted with disappointment.

‘But what about the fireworks?’ I said. The King had arranged for an enormous firework display over the gardens that evening and I absolutely couldn’t wait to see it. All of our weddings and celebrations at home in Vienna are marked by fireworks and I felt like it would make me feel closer to home.

‘I am sure that the rain will have gone long before they are due to start,’ Marie-Paule de Chaulnes murmured in her comforting way. Although it is her custom to only ever wear white, in tribute to her status as a virginal wife, she had donned a gown of the palest rose pink with matching roses at her bosom and in her soft fair hair in honour of my day.

The evening celebrations began at the stroke of six with card games in the candlelit Hall of Mirrors, watched closely by a curious throng of several thousand onlookers who passed slowly by behind a temporary gilt barrier and were moved brusquely along by the King’s formidable Swiss Guards should any of them linger over long. Before she left Austria to be married to the Duke of Parma, my sister Maria Amalia and brother Joseph spent a great deal of time teaching me how to play cards and gamble properly as such occupations are central to the life of Versailles where everyone is expected to take part and vast sums are won and lost every night. At the King’s table, however, it is not the done thing to make extravagant bets and Madame de Mailly warned me in a whisper that as a result play can be rather dull indeed.

So dull in fact that I almost fell asleep several times and had to be nudged awake by the Duc de Chartres who sat beside me and took a great interest in helping me with my hands of cards, often at a cost to himself. ‘Bet now,’ he whispered behind his hand upon which an enormous ruby glowed in the candlelight. ‘Hah, look at Madame Adélaïde squirm. She’s cheating as usual but no one is allowed to say anything.’

On the other side of the green velvet covered table, the Dauphin was frowning down at his cards and looking rather miserable. ‘Games of chance are not Louis Auguste’s strong suit,’ the Duc whispered to me with a wicked gleam in his dark blue eyes. ‘Unlike myself he is always far too afraid to gamble even when the odds are in his favour.’

It was still light outside and as we played I could hear music, shouts and laughter drifting up through the open windows from the gardens outside where several thousand people seemed to be having an enormous open air party with stalls of cakes and wine, dancing and even puppet theatres erected between the flowers on the parterre. How odd it seemed that I was stuck indoors playing boring card games in prim silence while outside people were celebrating my wedding day.

‘If the rain holds off, we should still be able to have the firework display,’ the King said to me when we finally got up from the table to make our way to the formal banquet. ‘We haven’t had a really splendid round of fireworks for many years now so I’m looking forward to it.’

‘When we were small, we used to go up on to the palace roof to watch fireworks,’ the Duc de Chartres murmured to me as I handed my small pale blue velvet bag of winnings to Jeanne de Mailly for safe keeping. ‘Perhaps I could take you up there sometime, your Highness? The views across the gardens and park are really quite stunning.’

I looked at him, feeling a little cornered, but could see nothing but an innocent wish to please me in his expression. ‘Thank you, Monsieur le Duc, that is most kind,’ I said, with absolutely no intention of ever taking him up on his offer. If anyone is going to take me up on to the roof and show me the sights of Versailles, it will be my new husband, that painfully taciturn boy who blushed and sighed miserably as he offered me his arm to lead me down the gallery.

‘I hear that you do not enjoy games of chance?’ I said to Louis as we made our way down the marble staircase.

He looked startled. ‘Did Philippe tell you that?’ he asked after a moment’s pause with a look over his shoulder at the Chartres couple who followed close behind us. I could hear the Duchesse shrieking with laughter at one of her husband’s whispered jokes and felt uneasy as I suspected that they were making fun of my ill fitting dress.

‘Yes.’ I nodded, wishing that I could hear what they were saying behind me.

Louis shrugged. ‘You shouldn’t believe anything that my cousin tells you,’ he said, leading me through a mirror lined vestibule and then down a series of galleries to a sweeping white marble staircase that rises up from a black and white tiled floor. Despite the immense bouquets of roses and lilies that had been arranged in front of the windows, there was still a subtle underlying aroma of fresh paint and I looked enquiringly at my new husband.

‘My grandfather ordered that the opera house be completed for the wedding. It’s taken a team of men several months of work to finish it in time,’ he said, leading me up the stairs. It is the most animated that I had ever seen him. He even smiled at one point – or perhaps it was just a trick of the light. ‘There were carpenters, stonemasons and painters everywhere.’

‘What do you think?’ the King turned and smiled proudly at me as we followed him into the marble walled foyer with tall high windows that spilled moonlight onto the polished parquet floor and beautiful crystal chandeliers twinkling overhead. ‘I believe that this is my finest addition to Versailles. I like to imagine my grandfather, the Sun King Louis looking down from Heaven with approval for what I have done here. It is finer by far than the theatre that he installed.’
I looked around myself with true pleasure. ‘It is very lovely,’ I murmured, which makes him smile even more.

‘Oh dear,’ the Duchesse de Chartres said, pointing up to the window with a little moue of disappointment, ‘the rain is coming back.’

‘Perhaps it will go away again,’ the King said hopefully but as we enter the opera house, it began to lash heavily against the windows making them rattle alarmingly. From outside we could hear shrieks of dismay from the thousands of merry makers in the gardens as they ran for cover while thunder rumbled ominously overhead and for a brief moment I found myself wishing that I was with them, running free as a bird through the rain instead of cooped up inside in a too tight dress with a grumpy husband and everyone staring at me.

‘Well, that’s the fireworks cancelled then,’ the Comte d’Artois muttered furiously behind me. ‘That was going to be the high point of the day. There’s nothing to look forward to now.’
If my first glimpse of the chapel was breathtaking then the first time I stepped into the Versailles opera house left me speechless. The smell of fresh paint was even more overpowering now and my mother, who likes the things around her to be old, tarnished and comfortable, would certainly sniff disparagingly at how gleaming new it all is with bright untarnished gilt decorations, shining salmon pink and jade green marble walls and brand new gold tassels on the swagged pale blue stage hangings. I don’t care, though; I think it is beautiful.

Although it is usually designed to be used as a theatre, much of the floor had been raised to the same level as the stage and an enormous table laid out for a splendid banquet had been placed in the centre of it – here we were to sit and dine in state while the rest of the court either milled around lower down in the pit or had staked claim to the mirrored balconies that line the walls. ‘Ingenious is it not?’ the Duc de Chartres leaned in so close to me that I can smell the cloves and wine upon his breath and a furtive scent of something else underneath that made me quickly take a step away from him. ‘It took three hundred soldiers all working together to raise the floor.’

‘How astonishing,’ I said, not knowing what else to say. I sat down on the King’s left hand and smiled across at the Dauphin, who was sitting opposite me then looked down the rose and peony covered table to where the Princesse de Lamballe was sitting opposite her elderly father-in-law, the Duc de Penthièvre, who is the Duchesse de Chartres’ father. She was fussing with her napkin and listening intently to a rambling monologue by the dark eyed, intense Comtesse de la Marche, who is the Italian daughter-in-law of the Prince de Conti.

And how do I know who these people are? Because of my lively new brother-in-law, the twelve year old Comte d’Artois who looks like an angel with high cheekbones, soft pouting lips and pale blue eyes but has the most wicked sense of humour ever. He whispered to me constantly through dinner, telling me about everyone there and relaying the most shocking scandals, most of which cannot possibly be true.

‘I see that you have made friends with Chartres,’ he whispered at one point and not very discreetly either so that I blushed red with embarrassment and looked down the table to be sure that no one had overheard. ‘Be careful around him.’

‘Why?’ I sipped at my wine. ‘He seems very friendly.’ I didn’t mention how uneasy he makes me feel or his offer to take me up on to the palace roof.

Artois raised a dark eyebrow. ‘He seems friendly,’ he said with a meaningful look. ‘He’s always been very adept at pushing himself in where he isn’t wanted. Aunt Adélaïde says that he would like to be King one day but of course all of us are in the way so he can’t be.’ He lowered his voice even more. ‘He was mad as fire when it was announced that you were coming to marry Louis,’ he said. ‘He’s terrified that you’ll have lots of babies and put him even further away from the throne.’

I blushed at the mention of babies and hastily looked across the table at the Dauphin, but he was busy cramming roast chicken into his mouth and hadn’t heard anything. ‘Isn’t he rich enough already?’ I asked, remembering what Jeanne told me about the Duchesse de Chartres’ enormous six million livre dowry. ‘Isn’t it better to be rich and a private person?’ I looked around the hundreds of people who had crammed themselves inside the beautiful opera house just to watch us eat. I am sure that if they were allowed, they’d all be lining up to watch us use the chaise percée afterwards as well. I can’t imagine actually wanting all this fuss and nonsense.

Artois stared at me as if I had completely taken leave of my senses and jumped onto the table to do a striptease in between all of the candelabras. ‘Are you really an Empress’ daughter?’ he asked at last, laughing. ‘Or is it like one of those fairy tales where a maid swaps places with the princess and teaches everyone a lesson in humility?’

I laughed too and gave an apologetic shrug. ‘I am sorry,’ I said, looking mournfully down at an aspic covered crayfish on my plate and pushing it away with my gold fork. ‘It’s just that I hate eating in public. Don’t you?’

‘Not really,’ he said with a yawn. ‘Of course, it is difficult to care as little as my brother,’ he added with a pointed look across the table to where the Dauphin was allowing a long suffering footman to help him to more roasted chicken and rich creamy caper sauce from the magnificent profusion of dishes in the centre of the table. Artois turned to grin at me. ‘He’s always had a good appetite,’ he said, patting his stomach. ‘It’s the Bourbon way. We all love our food.’ He nodded across the table to his other brother, the Comte de Provence and sister Clotilde, who were eating even more greedily than their elder brother. ‘Personally, I’d prefer not to be fat so I try to restrain myself a little.’ He sipped at his wine. ‘It’s more elegant, don’t you think?’

I smiled and nodded, my attention now caught by Madame Adélaïde, who had paused, fork in hand to glare from beneath her thick dark eyebrows up at one of the balconies. ‘Such impudence,’ she muttered furiously to one of her sallow faced sisters, who was shrinking anxiously into her chair. ‘This would never have happened if our sainted maman was still alive.’

I followed her gaze up to the balconies, which were stuffed full of gorgeously dressed courtiers, many of whom were leaning perilously over the edges of their boxes with their opera glasses and, astonishingly, telescopes trained upon us. It didn’t take me long to see who had provoked Adélaïde’s annoyance – in the very central box, directly opposite the stage there sat beautiful Madame du Barry in solitary splendour and dressed as if for battle in glittering cloth of gold with diamonds blazing at her ears, throat and wrists and even spangling the tall white and yellow feathers that she wore tucked into her curled and powdered hair.

‘Oh dear,’ I murmured, blushing as I remembered what Madame de Chartres told me of Du Barry’s rather less than impressive origins – that she is the illegitimate daughter of a seamstress and a monk and walked the streets before catching the King’s eye. It seems incredible that such a woman should end up here at Versailles, looking down at us all from her opera box like some sort of painted deity. As I stared at her, she gave a pouty little smile and lifted one sparkling hand in languid greeting.

‘Did you say something, my dear?’ the King looked up with concern from the pile of oysters that he was working his way through with immense enjoyment. ‘I hope that you are not becoming tired?’
I smiled and shook my head, pulling my gaze away from Madame du Barry. ‘Oh no,’ I said, hiding a yawn behind my hand. ‘I am not at all tired.’

He looked across at his grandson, the Dauphin, who sat on his other side and was busily stuffing roasted turbot into his mouth and eyeing up the elaborate cakes, puddings and sticky sugared fruits that had just been placed on the table by the liveried footmen who lined the back of the stage, waiting to anticipate our every wish. ‘My dear boy,’ he murmured. ‘Is it really wise to eat so much tonight?’

The Dauphin stopped eating and looked first at me and then at his grandfather. ‘Why not?’ he said tonelessly. ‘I always sleep better after a good meal.’

He spoke into a lull in the general conversation and everyone at the table turned to stare both at him and, more pityingly, me. I looked down at my plate, feeling my cheeks go red hot with shame as I heard the Duchesse de Chartres snigger and whisper ‘It looks like more than one firework display has been cancelled tonight,’ to the elderly Duc de Bourbon next to her, who started to laugh then cough into his napkin.

‘My dear,’ the King put his hand on mine and I looked up to see that his grey eyes were full of concern. He looked as though he wanted to say more but really, what can one say?

When the banquet finally came to an end, the King rose heavily from his chair, nodding grandly to the assembled company then with enormous dignity that couldn’t quite mask the fact that he had drunk rather too much of his own fine beaujolais and champagne left the stage, while we all scrambled into place to hastily follow him. The Dauphin, clearly unwilling to leave the food, wiped his mouth and greasy fingers with a fine linen napkin before throwing it aside and offering me his hand.

‘It’s been a long day,’ I said to him as we retraced our steps out of the opera house and back through the palace to my apartments on the ground floor. Our route was lined with courtiers, who smirked impudently at me as I went past. Everyone knew what was going to happen once the Dauphin and I were left alone.

Louis snorted and raised one shoulder as if in half agreement. ‘We have a week of this to look forward to,’ he grumbled. ‘Parties, the opera, a ball…’

‘Oh I love parties!’ I enthused, feeling frustrated by his dour manner and wanting to needle him a little. ‘And balls.’

‘I hate parties,’ he said, still not looking at me. ‘I’d rather be left alone.’ To do what?
The King had originally planned that we make our way in great and dramatic state across the moonlit courtyard from one wing of the palace to the other with running page boys carrying flaming torches to light our way, but the heavy rain and occasional rumblings of thunder put a stop to that. Instead we walked at a swift trot through endless candlelit, crowded rooms and up and down two sweeping marble staircases to get to my apartments on the ground floor of the opposite side of the palace.

Once we arrived there, I was ushered inside and led to a tall screen painted with climbing roses, peacock feathers and my personal cypher MA which had been placed at the side of the bed. After my heavy dinner, unusual amounts of wine and exhausting walk through the palace, I was longing to just tumble into bed and sleep it all off but unfortunately, this was not to be permitted as there was another public ceremony, the coucher, to endure first.

‘Your Highness must be publicly prepared for bed,’ Madame de Noailles whispered, ushering me over to the screen while the Dauphin was taken off to a matching screen on the other side of the bed by his grandfather, who with great ceremony handed him a white linen nightshirt.

I looked nervously around the great crowd of people who had followed us into the room and crammed themselves into the very corners just to watch us be put to bed together. My brother Joseph had warned me about this so I knew what to expect but even so I was unnerved by the sight of them all goggling at me as, with a saucy wink, the Duchesse de Chartres handed me my lace trimmed nightdress and I blushingly stepped behind the screen with my ladies in waiting to be stripped of my heavy wedding dress and changed into it.

‘They can’t see any of me, can they?’ I whispered anxiously to Jeanne, folding my arms in front of myself protectively as one of my ladies deftly undid my laces while another helped me step out of my enormous panniered silver skirts. Oh the relief to be finally free of them at last.

Jeanne’s eyes danced with laughter. ‘Not one little iota can be seen, Your Highness,’ she said, gently prising my arms away from my chest so that I could be eased out of my corset. ‘Only Monsieur le Dauphin will be permitted to lay eyes on you tonight.’

‘I don’t think he wants to,’ I whispered a little glumly as a maid quickly unpinned my hair and then brushed out the light coating of powder so that it fell heavy and warm around my shoulders.
Jeanne shook her head warningly and placed one finger lightly on her lips before producing a bottle of musky rose scent and dabbing it behind my ears, on my wrists and between my breasts.

I stepped out from behind the screen and stood awkwardly for a moment beside the great canopied bed with its elaborately swagged and tasseled raspberry pink silk curtains, waiting for the Archbishop of Rheims to finish the traditional blessing with holy water, while on the other side, the Dauphin also stood, looking awkward and pale legged in his white nightshirt. I wondered if I should smile and nod to him, so that he knew I felt peculiar and scared too, but as he was clearly so resolutely determined not to look at me, I instead turned my gaze towards the King, who was looking at the bed with an expression of great sadness.

As soon as the blessing was finished, I immediately pulled back the heavy embroidered silk coverlet and fine lace edged sheets and hopped into the bed. ‘Madame la Dauphine is very keen,’ I heard someone whisper with a titter. ‘I thought that Austrians were supposed to be a cold blooded race?’

‘Go on,’ the King urged the Dauphin, who was still standing beside the bed and looking down at the coverlet with an indecisive frown between his eyes. ‘In you get, my boy.’
Louis gave a shrug then clambered heavily in beside me, taking great care that no part of him, not even his nightshirt should come into contact with me. I can’t tell you how flattering this was.

The heavy curtains around the bed were slowly closed, plunging the Dauphin and I into gloom and hiding us from view. I listened to him breathing and considered reaching out to take his hand, but before I could do so, the curtains were once again opened, revealing us to the immense crowd of courtiers who smiled, nodded and applauded as though we have done something very clever indeed.

‘Regard,’ the King said to the courtiers with a proud flourish before turning back to his grandson and I. ‘We shall leave you both alone now,’ he said and again there was that slight sad smile before he turned on his high red heel and left the room with the bowing, smirking mob of courtiers in his wake. The Duc de Chartres lingers for a moment as everyone else streams past him and he gives me a sad smile before turning and joining the throng.

The door closed behind them with a click and in the distance I could hear the chatter, laughter and occasional hallooing hunting calls of the court as they noisily made their way up the stairs and back to the main apartments to continue the evening’s revelries.

The Dauphin made an exasperated noise then jumped from the bed again. For a terrible moment, I thought he was going to storm out but instead, to my relief, he merely went around the room pinching each of the candle flames between his thumb and forefinger. ‘Clearly they’d like us to burn to death,’ he muttered as he went about his work.

‘Perhaps your grandfather thought that we might like to see each other?’ I said timidly.

Louis looked at me then. ‘Why would we want to do that?’ he said before pinching out the last candle and plunging us into darkness.

I snuggled down into the bed and listened as he padded across the floor in his bare feet then climbed fumblingly back into the bed again before easing himself against the pillows with a sigh. Surely any minute now I would feel his hands upon me and his breath warm on the side of my neck? Perhaps he would even attempt a light kiss? Some nuzzling maybe? Or maybe something a bit more passionate?

I heard snoring from his side of the bed.

Oh.

Amazon UK: The Secret Diary of a Princess: a novel of Marie Antoinette

Amazon US: The Secret Diary of a Princess: a novel of Marie Antoinette.