Harem
He could have had any woman in the empire. He wanted only one.
“A page-turner . . . This peek behind the walls of the seraglio will seduce lovers of large-scale historical fiction.” – Booklist
He had everything a man might dream of; wealth, power and the choice of hundreds of the most beautiful women in his Empire. Why then did he forsake his harem for the love of just one woman, and marry her in defiance of the centuries-old code of the Osmanlis?
This is the astonishing story of Suleiman, the one they called the Magnificent, and the woman he loved.
Suleiman controlled an empire of thirty million people, encompassing twenty different languages. As a man, he was an enigma; he conquered all who stood against him with one of the world’s first full time professional armies – yet he liked to write poetry; he ravaged half of Europe but he rebuilt Istanbul in marble; he had teams of torturers and assassins ready to unleash at a whim – yet history remembers him as a great lawmaker.
Despite its luxury, his harem was virtually a prison. For one of his concubines, the only way to a better life was to somehow find her way into his bed and bear him a son. But the young Sultan was often away at war and when he did return he gave all his attention to Gulbehar, his favorite. Until one day, when a young Russian girl takes her fate into her own hands. She was clever and she was ruthless. And she had a plan.
Into this world are drawn two unforgettable characters; a beautiful young Italian noblewoman, captured by corsairs and brought to the Harem as a concubine; and the eunuch who loved her once, long ago, in Venice.
From medieval Venice to the slave markets of Algiers, from the mountains of Persia to the forbidden seraglio of the Ottoman’s greatest sultan, this is a tale of passion and intrigue in a world where nothing is really as it seems.
“ …a spectacular, haunting tale of malice, obsession, and zeal set in the magnificent Harem of Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent …” – History and Women
(Word count 76,000; available in ebook and print)
