Born into poverty and raised in a brothel, Nell Gwynne sells oranges in the pit at London’s King’s Theater, newly reopened after the plague and the Great Fire devastated the city. Soon, her quick sense of humor and natural charm get her noticed by those who have the means to make her life easier. But the street-smart Nell knows a woman doesn’t get ahead by selling her body. Through talent, charm, intelligence, and sheer determination—as well as a keen understanding of how the world operates—Nell works her way out of the pit and onto the stage to become the leading comedic actress of the day. Her skills and beauty quickly win the attention of all of London—eventually even catching the eye of King Charles II. Their attraction is as real as it is unlikely, and the scrappy orange girl with the pretty face and the quick wit soon finds herself plunged into the confusing and dangerous world of the court, where she learns there are few she can trust—and many whom she cannot turn her back on. From the gritty streets of seventeenth-century London, to the backstage glamour of its theaters, to the glittering court of Charles II, The Perfect Royal Mistress is a love story for the ages, the rags-to-riches tale of a truly remarkable heroine. Historical novelist Haeger relishes every aspect of her true-life subject's rags-to-riches story. Raised in seedy public houses in fire- and plague-ravaged London, Nell Gwynne uses her capricious wit and insouciant charm to catapult herself from the desperate life of an orange seller outside King's Theater into starring roles on its stage, where her alluring combination of availability and vulnerability attracts the attention of King Charles II. Known as an insatiable womanizer, Charles adds Nell to his stable of comely mistresses, despite her humble past. Too proud to be merely a sexual conquest, however, Nell calculatedly yet unabashedly endears herself to the king, whose wanton reputation masks his underlying need for someone to love and, more important, trust. The ultimate saucy wench, Nell possesses a bawdy comedic talent that might make her queen of the London stage, while only an accident of birth prevents her from being queen of England. A sensuously lively tale of ribald passion and royal politics, Haeger's captivating historical drama abounds with tantalizing scenes of courtly seduction, secrets, and salvation. Carol Haggas Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved DIANE HAEGER is also the author of The Ruby Ring, Courtesan, and The Secret Wife of George IV. She lives in California. Chapter 1 London, September 1666 Four days after the blaze began, consuming half of London and cutting a wide swath from Tower Hill to Fetter Lane, Nell stepped cautiously through the doorway of the tavern into the harsh light of day. For a moment, she lingered on the stone landing that jutted into Lewkenor Lane before stepping down into the tangle of lost souls, prostitutes, piles of garbage, and animal dung, so overpowering that her eyes watered. The canopy of sky remained gray with smoke and obscured the sun. A rash of smaller fires still blazed as the odor of charred wood and burned pitch mixed with the putrid stench of decay. It blew across the city, and would not let go. The flames had spread as far as Fish Street, and the Thames. The wide, serpentine river, normally dotted with thousands of decorated barges and boats with billowing sails, was still thick with debris and a heavy layer of soot. The ravages of the fire had spared the Cock & Pye, where she rented a garret beneath the eaves, as well as the other timbered and gabled houses around that end of Drury Lane. But the ashes, smuts, and little burned bits of paper still rained down upon the city. They were like feathers, she thought, until they landed, marking everything a desolate gray. Beneath her feet was a carpet of the same ash, dung, and soot that the wind had carried. Many Londoners, in one devastating evening, and the four days which followed, had lost every worldly good. It seemed unfair that a city should suffer such devastation after the ravaging plague of only a year before. But that was not her problem, then or now. Survival was. She tried not to look at the still smoldering ruins, like a tangle of skeletons against the skyline, as she quickly walked. Still, it was odd to see untouched buildings in the foreground--timber all neatly painted, window boxes still full of geraniums, sitting before a skyline of mangled and charred debris. She lowered her head and kept walking. Life was like that, really, she thought. One simply had to put one's head down and keep going along. Nell's thick copper hair was stuffed into a drab mobcap, and her gamine body was sheathed in a mud-brown dress with beige mock-sleeves. The tie at her bosom was ages-old leather. As she made her way from the area of close-packed timbered houses and dark, narrow, straw-covered alleys, the frayed hem of her dress licked the muck