Bøker av Mary Martin Devlin

Recently widowed, Sarah Laforge arrives in Zaire to take up her new post at the U.S. Embassy, determined to find meaningful work. The year is 1989 and the expatriate Europeans and Americans Sarah encounters in Kinshasa live in a privileged world where they drink, flirt, and gossip about who is sleeping with whom. But throughout all of this petty activity important business is getting done. Information is being gathered. Big power plays are being made. Jacques Delpech, a Belgian businessman born and raised in Zaire, also moves in these circles. His deep commitment to the country opens up another world for Sarah, while her idealism and openness help to soften his own painful memories. As a plot to overthrow the dictator Mobutu gains momentum, power, corruption, and sexual jealousy threaten to shatter their idyllic love affair.

In this lively retelling of the infamous Diamond Necklace Affair, the daughter of a bastard branch of French royalty, Jeanne de La Motte-Valois descends like a whirlwind on 1780s Paris. Jeanne rises by luck and pluck from the depths of childhood beggary to the pinnacle of court and Paris society, and cannot rest until she amasses the riches needed to support a life style befitting a princess. When she crosses paths with Prince Cardinal Louis de Rohan, the handsome, wealthy scion of the mighty house of Rohan, his own obsessive ambitions play perfectly into her plans. Add to this volatile mix the crown jewelers Bohmer and Bassenge, who in their bid for artistic immortality create a diamond necklace whose purchase would bankrupt a nation. From the glittering intricacies of the royal court to the dreaded cells of the Bastille, the La Motte woman concocts a masterful swindle that will rock the French throne and drag Marie Antoinette's name into the gutter.