The City of Tears

by Kate Mosse Book 2 in the The Joubert Family Chronicles series.

First published 2020

Amazon

4.4(13,973)

France, 1572. After a decade of religious war, Minou and Piet travel to Paris for the marriage of the Catholic Marguerite de Valois to the Huguenot Henry of Navarre. The wedding is intended to secure peace, but tension around the royal court, the Guise faction and Admiral Coligny quickly turns into organised violence against Protestants.

The Joubert family is caught in the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre and forced to flee towards Amsterdam. Separation, bereavement and the disappearance of a child transform a political catastrophe into a long family search. The novel combines documented royal figures and events with the experience of refugees, showing how religious policy and factional ambition enter households and continue to shape lives long after the immediate killing ends.

Historical Periods

St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre1572 CE

Genres

Court & Political Fiction Historical Sagas War Fiction

Historical people

Catherine de’ Medici1519–1589 Henry I, Duke of Guise1550–1588 Jeanne d’Albret1528–1572 Margaret of Valois1553–1615 Henry IV of France1553–1610 Charles IX of France1550–1574 Gaspard II de Coligny1519–1572