Book Review: Sex With the Queen

Posted by Lorri Brown Feb 12, 2007

Following up her bestseller, Sex With Kings, Eleanor Herman tackles the age old double standard of women who take lovers. Herman’s writing style is informative and interesting. It lacks the wordy jargon that is the trademark of so many history books.

Essentially the book covers five hundred years of European queens, from Eleanor of Aquitaine (the author’s namesake) to Princess Diana. Herman’s meticulous research reveals many intimate details of royal life, love and loss. It was surprising to discover how common a practice it was for a queen to take a royal lover, and how public many affairs were.

One of the best tales in Sex With the Queen is about a seemingly insignificant German princess. Sophia Dorothea of Celle who married the very unlikable Prince George Louis of Hanover in 1682. Mutual dislike at the onset of their marriage led to each conducting extramarital affairs. Sophia Dorothea fell madly in love with the dashing Count Philip von Konigsmark. After Konigsmark’s suspicious death, George Louis had his wife locked away at a run down estate in Celle, where she lived peaceably for twenty years doing charity work, until her own death in 1726.

More than just a list of tawdry details, Sex With the Queen examines the reasons behind royal affairs, and their historical consequence. For most women, a royal marriage did not result in a fairy tale ending. Too often the prospective bridegroom was mentally challenged, impotent, a brutal tyrant, or simply preoccupied with his mistress. Being a queen could be a lonely and isolating position for any woman. It is not surprising then, that so many royal women kept a lover or two, on the side.

A mixture of romance, scandal, intrigue and adventure, Sex With the Queen will keep readers entertained and fascinated until the very last page.