I read this so long ago. When I saw that it was still listed on my shelf, I had to re read all three books in the series by Sally Christie. I'm only sorry that I forgot to write the review here. I loved all the books. This was a very engaging book about Madame du Barry. An enjoyable read.

I’ve really enjoyed Sally Christie’s historical retellings of France’s King Louis XV and the women who shaped his life. The first two installments, The Sisters of Versailles and The Rivals of Versailles, led us through the king’s middle-aged years where he was first with the Mailly Nesle sisters and then Marquise de Pompadour. In The Enemies of Versailles, as France inches closer to revolution, King Louis XV scandalizes both his family and the court now that his mistresses have moved from nobles to a bourgeoisie to a common prostitute when he is enraptured by Jeanne Becu. The newly renamed Comtesse du Barry quickly inserts herself at the aging king’s side, growing the ire of his oldest daughters as well as his trusted advisors. Told in both Jeanne and Madame Adelaide, the king’s very assertive and judgemental daughter’s points of view, the third part of this trilogy was a joy to read–although I knew that King Louis XV’s life was ticking away just like France’s time under a sovereign rule.

Comtesse du Barry was a very interesting character and very easy to like, although she was a bit of a hot-headed, spoiled brat. Jeanne was a great beauty, loud, and boisterous–things that most nobles weren’t. She was different than Louis’ usual mistresses, only wanting to be presented at Versailles so she could be by the king’s side. Jeanne did want presents, jewels, and gifts, but she wasn’t quite as demanding as his previous conquests. She was very loyal to her family and true friends, and her love and support for the king never wavered–even when he sent her away on his death bed. While she did enjoy the finer things and comforts that her position as the king’s mistress afforded her, she was kind and generous to others, and Jeanne never could understand why the nobles and Louis’ daughters hated her so.

Madame Adelaide, the king’s oldest surviving daughter, is the polar opposite of Comtesse du Barry. She rules over her sisters about etiquette and proper behavior, chastising them at every turn. Adelaide is the biggest opponent to every one of her father’s mistresses, but Jeanne is the final straw for her. She uses her iron-fisted influence on the courtiers to blackball the Comtesse du Barry, only to further strain her already tense relationship with her father. Adelaide is definitely smart and learned, but she’s not very worldly when it comes to real relationships or what it’s like for regular people. She believes that the royal, privileged and protected life that they’ve lived is the only way to live, and that their way of life should be protected at all costs. While her and her sisters never married, they became the joke of the court as old spinsters with little influence on the king. Once the revolution begins, Madame Adelaide has no idea how far their royal family will fall…

I give The Enemies of Versailles a 4.5 out of 5. Following the life of Jeanne Becu from early childhood until death, her rise to prominence as Louis XV’s final mistress was an engaging and entertaining read. I loved getting a look at the life of the spoiled royals through Madame Adelaide, and I even felt quite a bit of sympathy for her in the end. Sally Christie’s writing is vivid, and I could easily picture Versailles and the other chateaux and countryside settings. With more modern writing and alternating POV chapters, The Enemies of Versailles flowed nicely while the tension ramped up to the end. Definitely check out author Sally Christie’s website for pictures of the women from the books, as well as secondary characters and places. It really brings everything together. I highly recommend this series to fans of historical fiction, especially European history.

"Enemies of Versailles" concludes Sally Christie's Versailles trilogy and it does so with a bang. Typically by a third book one has a sense of an author's style and what to expect. With a historical novel, even more so. (After all, we know how the story ends, don't we?) In "Enemies," though, Christie shifts tactics a bit and we see a more comic touch in the narrative. Part of this has to do with her commitment to the lead characters (one lovable but self-indulgently naive, another prissy and inflexible) and the natural consequences of their actions. Another part of this, though, is the clearly affectionate eye she casts upon the past as she concludes her trilogy. As a result, I have to say this is probably my favorite of the three books--delightfully done.

In these private moments, the great men of France are revealed for what they really are: men. Avid and greedy and ruled by their passions and desires.

The last of the trilogy and yes you must read them in order. Do not skip, do not jump, start from the very beginning. History has not been kind to King Louis XV and rightfully so, but Christie with a stroke of her pen has brought him some humanity in the desires that consumed him and his monarchy. At the end of his reign and the death of his Queen, he has found a new mistress in Jeanne Becu.

The narration is done by two women who loved him greatly in spite of his sins. His daughter that fervently prayed for his redemption and repentance and Jeanne who loved him but also loved what he offered her. Coming from the commoners, Jeanne was always beautiful. Used by men to gain power by her beauty, she saw life as an opportunity. The attraction for King Louis was not just her beauty but also her spirit.

His daughter Madame Adelaide desiring her father repentance also desired a loving relationship with her father. Always wanting to please him and falling victim to the reality she created.

Written with wit and humor, the characters become likeable in their selfishness and humanity. Christie gave them sorrow for the lives that they each lived but also responsibility to what they ultimately destroyed. I don't think I could have liked them any other way. I mourn that they could have been more if they were not driven by their own desires and deceit.

If you love historical fiction and some little spunk along the way, you will be thrilled with this.

A Special Thank You to Atria Books and Netgalley for the ARC and the opportunity to post an honest review.

Normally I am one of those people that has to read trilogies in the correct order, but here lately I've read two series out of order. I don't know what has come over me. I will go back and read The Rivals of Versailles, really I will.

The Enemies of Versailles is a great blend of history and fiction, just like The Sisters of Versailles. I love the way Sally Christie writes from the different characters viewpoints. I especially liked Madame Adelaide's. It is interesting that Louis XV's daughters were allowed to stay unmarried, the wars they waged on his favorite mistresses, and the influence they had on Marie Antoinette. At first, I found that du Barry was a much more compelling character than Adelaide. Adelaide was very pompous about her nobility while du Barry was, at first, doing what she could to survive and eventually coming to love Louis.

When you open this book it is like entering a time machine, and being there to enjoy every aspect of Versailles...the food, jewels, attire. It is almost like you are there, which made me dread the book coming to an end.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

I enjoyed this book about the last years of Louis XV's reign, especially the rise & fall of Jeanne Becu, aka Madame du Pompadour. How she pulled herself from poverty and was reinvented by her "protector" who attached himself to her "skirt-tails" as an entree into Court life. Her absolute obliviousness to anything beyond her small social circle, including the populace's growing discontent & impending revolution.
Multiple points of view, including Louis XV's oldest daughter & courtiers, provide backdrop to court intrigues and political maneuvering as well as historical perspective told from oft-silent sources.
An entertaining look behind the curtain of the French court in its twilight...

I loved the Versailles series, especially the Sisters of Versailles. The third book also included characters I knew little about, Madame Adelaide and the Comtesse du Barry. However, I found both stories a bit dull. Madame Adelaide, being the king's sister, was portrayed as an unmarried cow, which, from my brief knowledge, is about right. The Comtesse, however, was a trampy nymphomaniac. Again, seems about right from her biography. I just wasn't impressed with either character or their subsequent stories. I wish the characters had been... better? But as it seems they are portrayed exactly as they were in real life, I guess it is what it is.

While I loved the previous book in this series, The Rivals of Versailles, I found this story tiring at times. The story was very well written; however, I found the two main characters to be very annoying and unlikeable.

Jeanne, The Comtesse du Barry, was very frivolous and naive throughout the entire story. It was very hard to sympathize with her when she kept making incredibly idiotic decisions.

Adelaide, the eldest Princess, is very spoiled, controlling, and pompous throughout the story. Her inner dialog can be very over the top and again she is seen to repeatedly make stupid decisions by meddling in other people's lives. She does become less spoiled and pompous towards the end of the story but it takes a long time.

Overall, this book is well written but not as engaging as the previous book.

Christie crafted a wonderful trilogy, I am truly sorry to see it come to a close. I enjoyed every single book and would love the series to continue, however, I am looking forward to Christie's next project.

Christie has a marvelous way of bringing characters to life as well as immersing the reader into the era. Her writing is hypnotizing making this such a fabulous series.

I enjoyed the dual narrators - Jeanne, Comtesse du Barry and Adelaide, the daughter of Louis XV both similar and dissimilar. Two very different women coming from differing backgrounds yet both desiring love and affection matched with power and privilege. Their voices echo throughout the pages as each struggles with their issues.

My favorite aspect of the series is following Louis XV and his chain of women and their impact in his life. I also appreciated Christie inserting Marie Antoinette and the French Revolution in Enemies of Versailles great way to wrap up the poignant and exciting series in a powerful way.

A marvelous series historical fiction fans will enjoy as well as francophiles. A trilogy worth reading demonstrating Christie's talent as a storyteller marked by stellar writing and characterization.

The book focuses on the last official mistress of Louis XV, Jeanne Becu, better known as Comtesse du Barry. Coming from humble origins she gets a lot of enemies on her way to Versailles and one of them is Madame Adelaide, daughter of the king.

I’ve never liked the women in these books but still somehow loved the books. I don’t know why but here it didn’t work out so well. They were both selfish and wanted the easy life. Adelaide might know Greek but knows nothing about real life. And Jeanne practically grew on the streets; you would think that kicked some sense into her but no. She certainly wasn’t picked for her wits for sure… Even Marie Antoinette was silly and frivolous but even she grew up a bit (too late but still) when needed.

I did feel sad about Louis XV, though. I haven’t been a huge fan of him but I could feel his frustrations with his grandson. Of course, he didn’t help his grandson’s time as a king. Getting a kingdom on a brink of a revolution and debauched life Louis lived and money spending…

I would have liked if it was better stated in what year we were because suddenly you notice the story jumped 2 years, 10 years…

Overall I think this was ok. Which is a shame because I really loved the previous books and in this, I didn’t really care if people got guillotined or not.

VERDICT: Fabulous conclusion of this trilogy on Versailles. Through the author’s careful study and lively style, a major page of French history is made fascinating and easy to understand.
I recently reviewed Marie-Antoinette’s Darkest Days, focusing on Marie-Antoinette’s last months in prison. Now with The Enemies of Versailles, we are looking at an earlier period, coinciding with Marie-Antoinette’s arrival in France, as a young 14 year old. But this historical novel is far more than that, it’s a large fresco on the end of Louis XV’s reign as well as the end of an era.
This is actually the third and last book of a series, the Mistresses of Versailles. This “trilogy examines the personal life of a controversial monarch through the lives of his many mistresses”.
I regret that the unity of the trilogy was aesthetically broken by the publisher who decided to change the cover of this third volume. It would have made so much more sense to have three similar covers. Especially as covers 1 and 2 were had a unique style, and cover 3 had already been designed!
I think Sally Christie did a marvelous job through this trilogy at highlighting something unique in the life of King Louis XV. As she explains in the Afterword, his “preferences in women coincided neatly with the emerging egalitarianism of the Enlightenment: after the Nesle sisters (from the high nobility- see The Sisters of Versailles), he was the first king to have a bourgeois mistress (Madame de Pompadour – see The Rivals of Versailles) and then followed that scandal by becoming the first king to install at Versailles an official mistress from the lower classes (the Comtesse du Barry)”.
This collision between different worlds is astutely presented in this last book, with its double narrators: chapters alternate in the first person, between Jeanne Bécu’s (Comtesse du Barry) point of view and milieu, and Adélaïde’s (one of the king’s daughters).
Jeanne is a nobody at first, her mother cooks and sells chickens. After eight years spent in a convent for her education, she works in a shop and is noticed by du Barry. He uses her as a “milk cow”, a courtisane, but then manages to have her enter the world of Versailles, where she quickly becomes the king’s mistress.
Adélaïde is the most strict of the six sisters, “a paragon of virtue and discipline”, adamant at maintaining the etiquette at court. Her hate of La Pompadour (dying near the beginning of the book) will soon be replaced by her disdain for Jeanne, and even for Marie-Antoinette, when she realizes the young Austrian dauphine (brought in France to marry young Louis-Auguste, future Louis XVI) is much too informal.
You already have here several ways of understanding the title of The Enemies of Versailles. There are many more layers to it, as little by little, you feel the winds of change rising, that will end up with the killing of King Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, Jeanne, and many representatives of the monarchy.
Christie did a great job at describing life at court and then the shift of mentality throughout her book. This is nicely illustrated in the shift in mood: at first, the tone is light, funny even at times (for instance with the use of some hilarious subtitles for chapters, in the old mode of writing titles chapters, for instance: Chapter 6, in which Jeanne falls, but lands quite comfortably).
Little by little, things get serious and dramatic, with the Revolution looming then destroying all that the characters knew. If there’s a lot of giggling mentioned (a word quoted 45 times throughout the novel), characters slowly mellow as they age and get slightly more accepting. The end is more about human wisdom and experience.
The book is also of course a great window on the personality of Louis XV (and his relationship to women), as well as Louis XVI.
I would highly recommend the novel as a great primer on the circumstances and events announcing the French Revolution, as well as its dreadful happenings. Thanks to Sally Christie for making history so fascinating and never boring!

The Enemies of Versailles is a fitting ending to a wonderful trilogy! It's nice to hear history from a woman's point of view, and this series sure gives us that and more. Sally Christie is a wonder with historical fiction, she makes the settings and the people come alive. I have loved reading this series about the life of Louis XV and those close to him. So much intrigue, playing for position and favor, backstabbing, this series gives a good idea of what royal life must be like. I'm glad I'm a commoner!!

This latest offering shows an aging King, entranced with the beautiful Jeanne Becu, of common birth, and turned into a prostitute for the upper class and aristocracy by her married lover. When she gains the king's favor and becomes his official mistress, the outrage of his daughters and the court in general, knows no limits. Meanwhile, the French revolution is creeping nearer, and things will soon change for France as a nation.

A wonderful series for anyone who loves historical fiction. I have thoroughly enjoyed it, and am sorry to see it end. I look forward to Sally Christie's next work!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for allowing me to read an e-ARC of this fine book!

Here we are at the end of another favorite trilogy. And what an ending it is. Because each book deals with different mistresses of the king they can be read as standalone but I highly recommend starting at the beginning with The Sisters of Versailles, which I think is my favorite in the series. The Rivals of Versailles is Book #2, click on titles to take you to my review.

Jeanne Becu is a young child only seven years old when we first meet her. She will spend the next 10 years in a convent, but it is while working in dress shops that her life takes an about face after Comte du Berry walks in. She will become the last Mistress of Louis the XV, life isn't boring, how can it be in the French court?

Plus being hated by the King's own daughters doesn't help. Alternating chapters with Princess Adelaide, never married and obsessed with hating Jeanne she managed to convince others to do so also. Born into privilege with every advantage she wastes it. Knowing the king always had mistresses, but this one is of such low birth, her religious upbringing and judgmental attitude take over her life. There is so much in life she is missing out on that I actually felt sorry for her.

I love the authors writing style, her words took me to France, I could feel the hostility between these two women as they both just wanted to make the king enjoy his final years of life. I love reading about strong women in history, especially ones I am unfamiliar with, in location and time periods I rarely venture into and this series did not disappoint.

Reading this series has perked my interest in French history, the scandal, liaisons rival those of the English. Definitely a series I highly recommend.

Here we are at the end, the last book in The Mistresses of Versailles trilogy that started with the Sisters of Versailles and the five Nesle sister sisters, with four of them becoming mistresses to the King before Marquise de Pompadour took over the story and the King's affection in The Rivals of Versailles. In The Enemies of Versailles is Marquise de Pompadour dead and it's Jeanne Becu later Comtesse du Barry that will be the last mistress of the King. With du Barry comes also the end as the French revolution is looming on the horizon. She may not be the one to bring down a dynasty. But, the world she will come to belong to, the court is miles away from the ordinary people. And, the people have had enough! Off with the heads!

The Enemies of Versailles is a fabulous ending to a fabulous trilogy. I have enjoyed each book, but I have to admit that The Rivals of Versailles is the book I loved the most. Why, because I came to adore Marquise de Pompadour. She was such a marvelous person and the one that perhaps was the best for the Louis XV. I found her to be both strong and smart. Jeanne, Comtesse du Barry, on the other hand, is in her own way a very nice person. I did not, however, like her as much as I liked de Pompadour. But, what I liked with Comtesse du Barry is her like of scheming, it was everyone else around her that schemed. I think she would have been just as happy with a comfortable life with someone that she loved. Now, the book also had the point of view from Adelaide, the daughter of Louis XV. And I liked the contrast between the two main characters. Adelaide is such a stuck up person, who all through her life only wants her father's love. But, every mistress he has is an enemy to her, but it's not much she can do about that.

The books can be read separately, but I recommend starting from the beginning. By starting from the first book will you meet a young Louis XV and you get to follow his life through the women that he chose as mistresses. Also, through the books, can one also follow the growing dissatisfaction among the people.

Sally Christie is a superb author and when I came to the end of this book was all I could think "I want more, I want her to continue the story, I want the story of Napoleon through the eyes of the women around him".

4.5 stars!

http://scandalouswoman.blogspot.com/2017/03/review-enemies-of-versailles-novel.html

"The Enemies of Versailles" wraps up Christie's trilogy about Louis XV's Versailles. This novel follows Louis's last mistress, Jeanne, Comtesse du Barry, as well as his daughter Adelaide. While not as compelling as the two previous entries, Christie's characteristic humor is on full display. She excels at making unlikeable characters amusing as in the case of Adelaide. Jeanne, who has historically developed a bad reputation, is presented in a more flattering light as a woman who simply wants the finer things in life, but isn't so rapacious as to be heartless. Of course, Jeanne ended up on the wrong side of the guillotine during the French Revolution, which makes her portions of the novel all the more poignant.

The Mistresses of Versailles is a trilogy I’ve been recommending to anyone I know with an interest in historical fiction, especially fiction about French royalty. Most of the French historical fiction I’ve read centers on Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette or Napoleon. This is the first series I can remember reading that dives into Louis XV and the remarkable list of women and mistresses in his life. Looking at history, the build up to the French Revolution, the problems in the country, and Louis’s own problems through the lens of his mistresses and their relationships with him — it’s good reading.

THE ENEMIES OF VERSAILLES follows the end of Louis XV’s reign through the eyes of two women in his life: Jeanne Bécu, the Comtesse du Barry and Marie Adélaïde, one of his daughters. Jeanne was the first prostitute to be raised to maîtresse-en-titre. Previously, I’d only seen her in fiction through the eyes of Marie Antoinette; the two had a contentious relationship. So it was refreshing to see Jeanne in her own words, so to speak, rather than through the eyes of a teenager who was led to hate Jeanne for her low birth and the influence she had on the king.

The same thing with Adélaïde — I’d only ever seen her as the stern, spinster aunt, more concerned with etiquette than anything else. There’s a lot of that Adélaïde here, but I understood more about her and why she was so set on proper behavior, thanks to the author writing from her viewpoint. Adélaïde’s story is quite tragic really, and I appreciated the chance to see inside Versailles from such different perspectives.

Jeanne and Adélaïde both want the same thing: to make the king happy. But they go about it in vastly different ways, with Jeanne actually providing happiness and Adélaïde failing miserably because she tries to safeguard what little is left of her father’s virtue. As the women age, Adélaïde’s evolution from royal to citizen reminded me of the Marquise de Pompadour’s evolution from bourgeois to marquise.

If you haven’t read the other books in the series, and say you’re interested in Jeanne or Adélaïde, you can read THE ENEMIES OF VERSAILLES without being lost. I do recommend you read the other two, because I think each volume builds upon the last, both with the women in Louis’s life and the history leading up to the French Revolution. This final volume isn’t escapist as the first two (I compared them to a historical soap opera), but a worthy end to the trilogy. I look forward to see what Sally Christie tackles next!

I have been fascinated with Christie’s Mistresses of Versailles series since the first pages of The Sisters of Versailles. French history in general is an area that I am not as familiar with and therefore the stories are always new and exciting. While I still found many of the things that I enjoyed about the prior novels in the series, Enemies of Versailles didn’t carry quite the same level of feelings that I had for the first two books. Let me explain.

In both The Sisters of Versailles and The Rivals of Versailles, the women featured were all lovers of the King. This lent the chapters a competitive nature and added to the scandal that it was of the time. The Enemies of Versailles pits du Barry, his last lover, against his eldest daughter, Adelaide, and then to some extent the dauphine and later Queen, Marie Antoinette. Understandably, there is a very different dynamic at play here; at the very least they are fighting over very different types of love and power. This wasn’t as compelling a driving force for me as had been previously. It was a different kind of rivalry than I had come to expect from this series that wasn’t quite what I was expecting.

Additionally, I couldn’t help but take the side of du Barry (because you always pick a side in these types of stories). While she was the King’s lover and raised up from the gutter, she was for the most part kind and easy to read her way of thinking in her chapters. Adelaide was more difficult. Her frustration with du Barry all was because of simply her role as the lover of her father was a sin and she wanted to bring him back to the right side of God. It truly felt like a little girl not getting her way, which wasn’t cute on like a 50 year old woman. She was vindictive and conniving, yet she was supposed to be above everyone else. So ultimately I enjoyed the du Barry chapters more. One thing that I did enjoy was when Adelaide was with her whole bevy of sisters. There interactions reminded me of that of the Nesle sisters from The Sisters of Versailles; the backbiting, the one-up-manship, etc.

This book presented a different view of Marie Antoinette as well. Typically books about her feature her as a central character and we see her in a sympathetic light, or juxtaposed against the view of her from the common people. This was interesting to see how the two factions, du Barry and Adelaide sort of fought for control over her when she first came to court. She is a more minor figure in this story, but she is still used as a tool in the battle between the women. I actually enjoyed her portion of the story, even seeing her in a different way.

Overall, this was a good read, but not my favorite of the whole series.

I am always looking for one more historical fiction author who can transport me to another time and Sally Christie has filled that slot. With The Enemies of Versailles she has taken me to a time a place that is not typically on my go-to list and after reading this novel I cannot get enough of it! The Sisters of Versailles trilogy reminds me of Philippa Gregory’s Tudor series. It is a set that works well together but is also wonderful as a stand alone. Also, the intrigue of court is superb and is the glue that holds the book together.

Adelaide and Jeanne are our protagonists and could not be more different from another. Adelaide is royal, well brought up and slightly bitter of her father’s dalliances. In contrast, Jeanne has led a difficult life, having to work her way through the streets to become that dalliance. Due to the king’s roaming eye, tension is created that could be cut with a knife and I must say I love it.

However, Adelaide did bore me. There are only so many ways one can condone and “humph” at another’s actions and while it was an interesting look at the other side I felt it slowed down the story. Perhaps it is my preference towards plots with a romantic rendezvous but I much prefered Jeanne’s sections of the book and read each word greedily. There was more depth to her story and enjoyed her rags to riches tale.

Despite the fact that The Enemies of Versailles is the last in a trilogy it can easily be read on its own. Sally Christie has fanciful writing and breathes life into the palace of Versailles and, effortlessly creates a story that takes little effort to be drawn into. Overall, The Enemies of Versailles is a novel I would recommend to lovers of historical fiction set in the grandeur of France or for anymore who enjoys a good romance with a little spice.