The Lady Queen: The Notorious Reign of Joanna I, Queen of Naples, Jerusalem, and Sicily

Instead of using Henry VIII for their soap opera, HBO should have looked at Queen Joanna. In terms of betrayals, love affairs, good guys, and bad guys, her life has more of it then any 10 Henry's. As with the Four Queens, Goldstone does a great job of making medieval history accessible and exciting for the non-academic. The book explains her rise to power and her efforts to keep it while everyone around her is literally willing to sell their mother's soul to get a piece of her and her kingdom. The fact that she partially succeed in defending her kingdom is impressive, but that she ultimately fails may have been tragic for the entire country. Yes, the number of Louis's and Robert's does get confusing, but hey, that's the way it was. While the book never directly looks at it, one can't help but wonder if this self serving attitude on the part of Italy's ruling class is why Italy never rose to the heights of power that England, France, and Spain did?

This would make a great movie. It has everything: power, war, intrigue, plague, knights, kings, a manipulative morther-in-law, treason, double crossing, etc. etc. It's a real page turner. Highly recommended.

This is a fascinating study of Joanna I of Naples' life and times. The author does an excellent job of bringing the economic disasters, and political and family feuds and infighting of this era to life despite the destruction of much of the original sources in World War II. I have been waiting for a decent modern English language biography of Joanna of Naples, and it is now here. The Lady Queen is a worthy successor to Goldstone's first medieval biography, Four Queens.