Napoleon's Shadow Wife: A Novel of Countess Marie Walewska

How is it that an emperor like Napoleon Bonaparte could be so entranced by twenty-year-old Polish Countess Marie Walewska-of minor nobility-that their affair would outlast his relationships with wives Josephine and Marie Louise?

Countess Marie Walewska is a fascinating Polish beauty and patriot who catches the eye of Napoleon Bonaparte. When Marie's first taste of possible love with a young, dashing soldier comes to a bad end, she is pressured by her family, at seventeen, to marry a wealthy ...