Читать книгу Once Upon a Scandal - Delilah Marvelle - Страница 2

Dear Reader,

I have always wanted to create a grittier version of a fairy tale similar to what the Grimm Brothers explored. I wanted to write a real-life fairy tale that had every possible wrenching emotion in it, but without any of that easy-way-out magic. So I set about creating a very twisted version of Cinderella. Only instead of making the heroine Cinderella, I wanted the hero to be Cinderella. I wanted the prince to be wildly romantic and kind and forever looking for his Princess Charming the way Cinderella had. So I gave him a big heart and, introduced him to a stepmother who never liked him and, in turn, forced him to become a servant of a different sort. I then balanced his hardship by giving him a charming stepsister who absolutely adores him and who sought to protect him at every turn. Instead of a glass slipper, I thought a ruby ring would best unfold my fairy tale.

Now, as much as I adore England and its history, I have always wanted to set a story in beautiful Venice. So I started digging into its fascinating history and uncovered the cicisbeo (also known as Cavalier Servente). For those of you who don’t know what a cicisbeo is, it was a practice in Italy amongst the nobility in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that allowed a married woman to keep a man, whom her husband agreed for her to have during their marriage, for a specified amount of time. It is said Lord Byron himself was a cicisbeo for a period of time to the married Contessa Teresa Gamba Guiccioli and that her husband was known to boast about it. Although scholars will argue as to whether a cicisbeo was also a lover to the married woman he served (some say yes, some say no), the lines blur enough for the story to swing either way. I’ll leave you, dearest reader, to figure out on your own which way I’m swinging.

Much love,

Delilah Marvelle