Set at the heart of the treacherous political world of the Italian Renaissance, this is the masterful story of a young woman’s battle for her very survival, written with all the drama and verve that made Hamnet an international bestseller.
1560s, Florence. Lucrezia, third daughter of Cosimo de’ Medici, is free to wander the palazzo at will, wondering at its treasures. But when her older sister dies on the eve of marriage to Alfonso d’Este, Lucrezia is thrust unwittingly into the limelight: the duke is quick to request her hand in marriage, and her father to accept on her behalf.
Having barely left girlhood, Lucrezia must now make her way in a troubled court whose customs are opaque and where her arrival is not universally welcomed. Perhaps most mystifying of all is her husband himself, Alfonso. Is he the playful sophisticate he appears before their wedding, the aesthete happiest in the company of artists and musicians, or the ruthless politician before whom even his formidable sisters seem to tremble?
In the court’s eyes, she has one duty: to provide the heir who will shore up the future of the Ferrarese dynasty. Until then, for all of her rank and nobility, her future hangs entirely in the balance.
Maggie O’Farrell is the author of Hamnet, which won the Women’s Prize for Fiction in 2020, and other novels including This Must Be The Place and Instructions for a Heatwave. Hamnet stunned readers, telling the story of the little-known backstory surrounding the making of Shakespeare’s masterpiece Hamlet. In The Marriage Portrait, O’Farrell takes readers into the opulent heart of Renaissance Italy. Anyone familiar with this historical period would know of the Medici banking and political dynasty. The Marriage Portrait is a breathtaking and devastating account of the life of Lucrezia, a mysterious Medici woman whose life was cut short at such a young age, meaning her story has been sadly overlooked. O’Farrell allows her to reclaim her voice in this marvelous novel.
The novel has a shocking opening: Lucrezia is found dead in unusual circumstances less than one year after her marriage. From this point on, the reader is burning with the question: what really happened to Lucrezia? The storyline weaves back and forth between Lucrezia’s childhood growing up amongst the splendour and riches of the Medicis, her marriage when she was barely a teenager, to her living in fear of her controlling and conniving older husband. The Marriage Portrait is a heartbreaking tale of Lucrezia’s lost innocence, and a remarkable story of the courage she displayed.
The Marriage Portrait is another stunning novel from O’Farrell. Fans of historical fiction and anyone interested in Renaissance Italy will devour it.
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