Lucien, the Rebel Brother of Napoleon. Family and Power

Little is known about Lucien Bonaparte, except that he played a decisive role in the coup that brought his brother, Napoleon, to power and allowed him to become the most powerful man in Europe of his time. However, we know undeservedly little about the story of Lucien’s life and the selfless love for the woman whose union with him kept Napoleon restless for many years.

"… it is a highly engaging portrait of an outstanding clan, whose members are inextricably linked to each other by family ties, politics, and greatness, yet perpetually torn apart by jealousy and intrigue"
The New York Review of Books

The story of love and power told in this book is largely based on the Memoirs of Lucien, found by the author-historians in the archives of Paris and the family archives of the Italian branch of the Bonaparts, whose descendants still live in their mansion near Perugia. It was there that Countess Albaliza Faina Roncalli warmly welcomed Marcello Simonetta and Nogu Arihu and provided them with dusty folders containing missing unpublished fragments that were not included in the edition of Lucien's memoirs published in the 19th century. Thanks to these previously unexamined materials, it became possible to piece together the puzzle of all the twists of fate of Lucien, his love story, and his relationships with family and power.