Customer Reviews

Royal Harlot: A Novel of the Countess Castlemaine and King Charles II

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The first time I heard of Barbra Palmer, the Countess Castlemain was when I read "Forever Amber" and since I've seen her appear in numerous historical fiction novels, but I'd yet to see anything from her point of view. And it seems like if you're going to have generations of people referring to you as "the great whore" you should at least be able to tell your side of the story.

But that's not what "Royal Harlot" is. Yes, its Barbara in her first person glory but even through the medium of Susan Holloway Scott" she makes no apologies. Did she not save herself for marriage-of course not. Why should she have? Sex is fun. Did she cheat on her husband-oh yes. Have sex with the king-duh. In fact pretty much the only "evil" that can't be ascribed to the Countess is killing puppies-because she probably did kick them (what else is one to do if the king lets them stay on the bed when you're having sex in it?)

Yet for all her lax moral standards Barbara wasn't just a one woman girls gone wild show, she had the ear of a king for over ten years and was a powerful and influential woman-as powerful as they come. In age when decadence was the norm and luxury rose to new heights she was the it girl-hated and envied by all.

Though I wouldn't say Scott's portrayal of Castlemain makes one sympathetic for her it does portray her as something other than sleazy sex on a stick as many other books do. She had a brain, and used it not only to keep the king ensnared for years beyond what anyone would expect but to provide for her six children, (four by the king, one by John Churchill and one a toss up between the king and her husband) to wring money and jewels from foreign ambassadors and to help re-establish the monarchy in England. I wish I could say she used her brilliant mind to help the people of England, but no. Barbara was more into helping herself and those immediately around her.

No she's not Elizabeth or Mother Teresa-she's Barbara Palmer and this is her story. It's filled with sex, beautiful clothes and jewels, handsome men and pretty women. It's a wild ride, but instead of being a novel motivated by plot, it's the story of Barbara's life between the ages of 15 and 31 and so there isn't a real story to follow, which can make parts tedious. It's a great character study and portrayal of one of history's infamous women, but it's not a great novel. There's too much of Barbara and too little story for that.

On a technical note it's nice to see that even though Scott used first person for this and her book on Sarah Churchill she managed to give each woman a very distinctive voice. This is not an author who projects her personality onto the subject as it is so easy to do. She truly writes as the actual person might have which is a mark of great skill.

Four stars. I look forward to Scott's next book, which is about Nell Gwyn and is being published in July.

Susan Holloway Scott follows up her first novel, Duchess, with another one that is set in the heady, pleasureable courts of the later Stuart kings of England. This time, the heroine of the story is Barbara Villiers, and the story is told through her eyes. We first meet Barbara on her first visit to London, where the year is 1656, and England is straining under the rule of Oliver Cromwell, the Lord Protector of the Commonwealth, and for Royalists such as Barbara and her family, life is dreary indeed. For a fifteen year old girl like Barbara, life without music or dancing or the theatre is dull indeed, and when she comes across a fellow Royalist nobleman, Lord Chesterfield, she leaps at the chance to taste forbidden delights with him.

Barbara is delighted to be Chesterfield's mistress and manages to decieve her mother, who, after all, is just going to sell her off to the highest bidder that can further the family interests. But all too quickly, Chesterfield is exiled, and Barbara finds herself married off. Robert Palmer is a dull man, serious and only interested it seems, in money. Their marriage is an uneasy one, and while Robert certainly feels desire for her, Barbara longs for more.

More comes when she manages to be sent to the Netherlands, where the son of the executed Charles I holds together the hope of England's return to a monarchy. Charles II is poor, lives in a near ruinous inn, but still can have that aura of being a king, even if he is a landless one. In the future Charles II, Barbara finds a man that can match her in vitality and sensuality, and when Charles is finally the king of England, she goes to his court in triumph.

We get to see Barbara's marrage fall into ruins, but her relationship with Charles II leads not just to the vivid world of the court, but also a crop of illegitimate children that Barbara adores, and a grand lifestyle. If Charles marries a Portuguese princess and dallies with other women as well, Barbara knows that he will always return to her, especially if she throws a scene or two to keep him hopping back into her bed.

But there is a dark side as well -- she's the target for those who sees the king's court as decadent, and her name and reputation is well-tarnished. Too, Barbara isn't too lofty to use her influence to garner quite a few bribes for herself and advantages for her children. She and the king fight just as much as they make love, but how long will her beauty and wit last with the king's patience?

Scott's novel is very well-done. The pace moves along quickly, and rarely lags, covering the early reign of Charles II, and the grim years when England did not have a monarchy. The big events of the day are covered, from Royalist plots to the wars with the Dutch, and the scheming with the French, and up to the Great Fire that destroyed much of London. There are plenty of descriptive passages for the music, clothing, and entertainments of the time, but Scott manages a good balance between the action and the description. Too, she knows some of the more personal details about Charles II, and I was delighted to see that she included the king's spaniels throughout the book.

Barbara is a spitfire of a character, not above using bawdy language and falling in and out of lust whenever she likes. While she's certainly not a virtuous character, she does have her own code of honour throughout, which makes for an interesting read. You might not like her very much, but she is also not forgetable at all. For anyone interested in the Restoration period of England, this would make an acceptable read, and a good starting point for some of the more serious works, such as Antonia Fraser's Royal Charles.

This trade paperback edition has an afterword by the author, a reader's guide for book club discussions, and an excerpt from Scott's next novel, The King's Favorite about another mistress of Charles II, Nell Gwyn.

Recommended.

Barbara Villiers Palmer, later known as Lady Castlemaine, is one of history's most infamous and scandalous royal mistresses. Though best known for her beauty and long-lived affair with King Charles II which produced four or possibly five children, Barbara Palmer's contemporaries vilified her not only for her "adultery" with the King, but for her well known sexual appetites which she sated with many other men, and out of spite and jealousy for her beauty, and the power and influence she wielded at King Charles II's court.

Susan Holloway Scott has written a titillating novel based Barbara Palmer's years at the English Court. We meet her during the drab Cromwell years as she is denied love from her mother and finds it in the beds of young male royalists who fancy themselves plotters to restore the monarchy. She marries the uptight Roger Palmer against her own better judgment, but through him is introduced to the man who would change her life - King Charles II.

Holloway Scott documents more sexual escapades of Ms. Palmer than one can count, but fortunately she does not delve into too much detail to make it entirely tedious. The picture is clear - Barbara used sex to scratch most every kind of itch... love, desire, boredom, poverty, political intrigue, jealousy, monotony, monogamy, etc. Clearly there is documentation to support much of the reputation she earned.

The longevity of her affair and friendship with Charles speaks for itself. In each other they found an equal partner in friendship, love, sex, and spirit. As such, Barbara Palmer rose to be one of the most influential people of her time and was essentially queen in all but name and title. As is often the case, women with such power are the subject of fear, spite, and jealousy. Her contemporaries, and since historians, continuously presented her as a scheming, manipulative, hard, unfeeling whore. Holloway Scott does not deny these facets of her character, but she provides context and complexity to Barbara's person. We see a loving side, ferocity in protecting her children, determination, political skill, wit and cunning. She is actually admirable and likable!

Barbara Palmer lived a fantastical live during an amazing period in history. "Royal Harlot" is an absorbing story of the personal escapades of the Restoration's two most infamous people. Holloway Scott does not lose focus of who her main character - little is written on these pages about the other well known mistresses of the King. For the most part, she excludes the jealous outbursts, vindictive acts and mean-spirited sharp tongue that other authors consistently assign to her Ladyship. She instead portrays Barbara's confidence in her role by the side of the King as rather unflappable, and thus all other consorts are not worth her concern. This incongruence with other written and film presentations of her character threw me a bit, and I felt slightly disappointed to not get to see her in action AND be rooting for her!

Susan Holloway Scott has proven herself an adept novelist for the Restoration period with the Royal Harlot and her previous book, Duchess. I look forward to her next release based on the live of Nell Gwynn! Fans of this period & genre may also enjoy "King's Touch" by Jude Morgan, "The Perfect Royal Mistress" by Diane Haegar, and "Dark Angels" by Karleen Koen.

Once again Scott does a masterful job of capturing the atmosphere and intrigues of life at court. This time the setting is the Restoration, and the notoriously licentious court of King Charles II--and at center stage is his famous/infamous mistress, the Countess of Castlemaine. Though Scott never tries to make a saint of this sinner, but shows us the woman, flaws and all, Royal Harlot makes it easy to understand why the king remained captivated for so long. This is a fascinating portrait of a complex and intriguing woman, who did as she pleased and got away with it. By turns bawdy, funny, shocking, and poignant, Royal Harlot is even better than Scott's excellent previous work, Duchess. I read it twice.

The Countess of Castlemaine, labeled the Great Harlot of Charles II, never denies or regrets her nature in this fascinating rendering of an outrageous love affair that defies convention and public outrage in Restoration England. Come to Ludgate Hill, London, in 1656, at her mother's request, Barbara Villiers, future consort of Charles II, has, at fifteen, no dowry or expectations. Informed that she must make a suitable match to ensure future security, Barbara instead pursues a wanton lifestyle, the paramour of Lord Phillip Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield, a roué who happily seduces the willing young woman. But fate and fortune find Barbara married to Roger Palmer, a dedicated Royalist who toils to restore Charles Stuart to the English throne on the heels of Oliver Cromwell's demise.

In the course of traveling to Brussels with secret letters and gold for the banished king, Barbara begins an affair with Charles that will scandalize the court and win her scores of admirers and enemies over the next decade: "I was a Villiers, beautiful and fashioned for royal pleasure, to his charming, irresponsible Stuart." Charles sets about literally restoring England to its former splendor, if a bit too enthusiastically. Moving graciously among his people, Charles is a visible king, a successful monarch inspiring his long-suffering subjects. His dalliance with Barbara is tolerated, but there is much gossip about the growing extravagance of the court and the king's shameless indulgence of the courtesan's every whim. Politically astute, her influence in Charles's court is significant; Barbara learns the necessity of political expediency, pragmatic and judicious in all but her physical exploits with the king. The Countess of Castlemaine devotes her considerable energies, in the king' bedchamber and out, towards protecting her future, bearing Charles five illegitimate children, all claimed as Fitzroy's.

In the context of history, though labeled with the vilest epithets as a woman of prodigious appetites, Barbara takes advantage of her female attributes. She works with the talents at her disposal; everything she does, every action is motivated by self-interest, including her assessment of the delicate emotional terrain of Charles's marriage to the barren Iberian queen. Restricted by gender and birth from reaching higher, this is a woman whose brilliance is matched by her beauty, her reputation scorching the pages of history. Aware of her fleeting youth, Barbara is the ultimate pragmatist, allowing herself the rewards of her relationship with Charles, bearing the king's children, ignoring his compulsive indiscretions and supporting him through the changing face of English politics, the plague and the Great Fire of London in 1666.

Relating the details of Barbara's fictionalized life, the author takes into account the historical events and unusual influence of a powerful woman in the Restoration court, fleshing out the countess's adventures with gusto, her flaws all the more glaring in the waning years of her power. All in all, this is a thorough and imaginative recreation of Palmer's long career and her extraordinary talent for manipulating circumstances to her own advantage, an informative and plausible treatment of the controversial life of a successful woman in a man's world. Luan Gaines/2007.

I did enjoy this book. This book and the Duchess are the first books I have read set in the 'restoration' period of England, so I think I am still surprised by the openness of the immorality that ran so rampant in those days. But if you are going to read a book called, 'The Royal Harlot', you need to expect such episodes! I am not a fuddy duddy, but there was ALOT of sex!..... but the book plot was well written and did keep me up waiting to see what was going to happen next. I liked reading it in Barbara's point of view. It made it more real. I thoroughly enjoyed reading about King Charles and Lady Castlemaine. I even did more research on each of them after I read this.

Europe's treatment of a King's mistress was pretty brutal and very scary most of the time. Throughout her life Barbara Castlemaine survived because of her intelligence, her understanding of the position she held, how best to use it and, more importantly, she understood what Charles II needed and wanted and used that sense and sensibility to survive. She was surrounded by foes, naysayers, some friends, and lots of envy and dislike, but most importantly she was an emotional and psychic link to King Charles II that he obviously needed to feel complete. It wasn't easy being "royalty"; Barbara knew that, grasped her opportunity and went toe-to-toe with her adversaries, defeating their many attempts to bring her down. It wasn't just her beauty and the knowledgeable sex she obviously perfected, this woman was a foxy broad who learned how to survive and if England had been smart enough to recognize her good qualities and royal acumen they would have made her Charles II's Queen. The book was a well-written story of a fascinating, extraordinary woman of her times who understood the odds against her and lived to beat them.

"Royal Harlot" is a work of historical fiction that focuses on the rise of Barbara Villiers, the most notorious of Charles II of England's many mistresses. Barbara is born into a modest family and is stunningly beautiful, yet far from innocent. After her many sexual liaisons, she eventually settles for a rather boring marriage to Robert Palmer, and is pretty miserable with her life until she is called to serve the exiled king, Charles. Eventually Charles returns to England, and he beckons Barbara to his side. Barbara enjoys the many perks that come along with being the king's mistress, but also endures many trials as well.

I enjoyed this book. Barbara is a great character, and despite her selfishness and rather lewd behavior, I found myself rooting for her from the very beginning. The first fourth of the book is a bit tedious, and things really start to pick up when Barbara joins Charles at court. Unfortunately, I felt kind of cheated by the ending, which felt very rushed, but anyone who enjoys Philippa Gregory's novels or any other type of trashy historical fiction will get a kick out of this book.

I find Barbara Palmer/Villiers an extremely interesting historical figure, as do many people. I really like the author's perception of her in this novel, as it wasn't overly critical and yet at the same time didn't shy away from the truth of her character. The novel built up the dynamic relationship between Barbara and Charles II and at it's height it was a definite page-turner.
However, unfortunately the novel lost it's spark towards the end and fizzled out quite drastically. To be fair, this was perhaps to do with the fact that in reality the royal relationship did in fact fizzle out this way. There was no spectacular ending--as there was between Charles II and Nell Gwyne (their relationship ending with his death, and Nell not being permitted at his bedside).
Nonetheless, I enjoyed this book and I believe Susan Holloway Scott gave a good insight into the heart and mind of a notorious woman of the 17th century.

This is the story of Barbara Palmer, notorious mistress of King Charles II of England.

I had a terrible education in history--which is not to say that I had trouble with it in school, but it was deadly dull. Rote memorization of names and dates that I promptly forgot after each test. I was so bored with it that I steered clear of the subject in college, mystified by why anyone would choose such classes.

All of which is just a long-winded way of explaining that before picking up this book, I had no idea who Barbara Palmer was.

You can also tell that I don't read fictionalized biographies often, because I was surprised that Barbara's character wasn't sugar-coated, or made to seem noble and wise. Nor was she vilified, as she had been in life.

It's a clear, fascinating, readable account of an ambitious woman who married for respectability and had a long-lasting affair with the king for power and friendship, and maybe love.

Unlike Sarah Churchill in Scott's previous book, Barbara wasn't all that interested in politics. She was interested in Barbara. And then when she had children, she was interested in their welfare and future prospects.

Barbara's actions were viewed as wicked and immoral at the time, and even from a modern perspective, they're not by any means admirable. But seeing the very real woman behind the actions--a very ordinary woman, even if she was celebrated for her beauty, full of both strengths and faults--was quite thought-provoking.

I don't think I'll start looking for books in this genre, or researching the time period, but I will definitely be buying The King's Favorite in July.