Mistress of the Sun

March 3, 2008
As she did for Napoleon's wife (The Many Lives & Secret Sorrows of Josephine B.
), Gulland skillfully blends fact and fiction to imagine the life of Louise de la Vallière (1644–1710), mistress to Louis XIV, France's Sun King. Louise loses her father early and spends her childhood in a convent run by her aunt, Sister Angelique. When Louise's mother, Françoise, marries a marquis, she takes Louise home, where, by chance, she meets King Louis. As she secures a position at court about 100 pages in, the plot finally begins to bubble with intrigue: the king has married for political reasons, but, as a young and pious man, he has not kept a mistress before Louise. Their secret love eventually comes to light, but not without exacting a price. A supernatural element threaded throughout adds color to Gulland's vivid period imaginings.

Not only is Diana Leblanc comfortable with French pronunciations, she lingers over sensory details and differentiates classes with nuanced accents as she welcomes us into the world of Louise de la Vallire, the adored mistress of the Sun King, Louis XIV. Known to us and those of her era as "Petite," she had a childhood of wild rambles in the woods of her father's country estate. When she uses "bone magic" to tame a wild stallion and the horse kills her father, she's fearful about having sinned. After capturing the heart of Louis XIV, Petite's passionate and pious natures again collide in a court that is thrilling, or chilling, depending on the politics of the moment. Leblanc brings strength to the court's shifting alliances and Petite's internal struggles. S.W. (c) AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine