Napoleon and Josephine: An Improbable Marriage By: Evangeline Bruce

Taking a different tact from other biographies, Ms. Bruce's look at Napoleon and Josephine is a biography of their marriage.  Told using their own letters, as well as the writings of others, this is a fascinating look at a couple who are still wrapped in a little mystery. Their lives were so entwined with the social, economic and political movements that the reader gets a healthy dose of the history of the time in which they lived.  Of course, there are so many conflicting stories about who these two really were, that everything written about them has to be taken with a grain of salt.  With that said, Bruce does an amazing job of culling through a lot of nonsense and getting to the heart (as much as she can) of who this couple was, what they meant to each other and how their relationship (and it's ups and downs) affected and empire.  Having known nothing about either of them, I found this to be a fascinating read.