The Plantagenet Prelude — Jean Plaidy

ONE OF THE MOST GLAMOROUS HOUSES IN HISTORY--THE PLANTAGENETS. A FIERY, ROMANTIC ROYAL FAMILY, AS VARIED AS THE
BRANCHES THAT GREW FROM THE FIRST MIGHTY TRUNK...

ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE
--A brilliant, elegant beauty whose hunger for men was rivaled only by her passion for power.

HENRY, DUKE OF NORMANDY
-- A man as irresistible to women as the throne was to him.

These two sensual aristocrats formed a union that defied all nobility--even the King of France. Theirs was a coupling that laughed in the face of all court convention.

But once their passion for one another was spent, it was replaced by the fire of hatred. Even Thomas a Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, was consumed by the blaze of their royal battle, leaving a bloody stain upon Church and State that haunted the course of the Plantagenet epoch--a rule that began with this tumultuous, tempestuous, story.