Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma

Marie Louise was an Austrian archduchess who became Napoleon’s second wife and empress of the French in 1810. She gave birth to Napoleon II and, after the emperor’s fall, ruled the duchies of Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla under the settlement imposed by the victorious powers.

Michelle Moran’s The Second Empress is set after Austria’s defeat in 1809, Archduchess Marie Louise is required to marry Napoleon, the ruler she has been taught to regard as her country’s enemy.