9 h 40 minAudiobook7 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if the blood ties you cannot name hold more power than the loyalties you choose?
In The Regent's Daughter, Alexandre Dumas and Auguste Maquet bring you into a France ruled in a child king's name. Philippe, Duke of Orleans, enjoys private suppers while enemies plot against him. Beside him, Guillaume Dubois gathers secrets and serves power with cunning.
Into this dangerous world comes Gaston de Chanlay, a young Breton nobleman with a strong sense of honour. Politics draws him into peril, while love makes its own demands. Helene's birth remains a secret tied to the Regent, and her fate brings the claims of family, loyalty and the heart into sharp conflict.
What you’ll discover
- A court of secrets Enter a world where private suppers, clever ministers and hidden plans shape the struggle for power.
- A ruler beyond easy judgment Meet a brilliant, pleasure-loving Regent whose forgiving nature complicates the picture his enemies would paint.
- Honour under pressure Follow Gaston as dangerous politics tests the loyalties of a young man drawn into love.
- The weight of hidden birth Discover how Helene's secret origins make blood ties a deeply personal question rather than an abstraction.
- History with a pulse Feel the pace of an adventure that brings political conflict close to the heart.
Who will love it
For readers who enjoy swift historical adventure, court gossip, secret plots, quick dialogue and love stories set against real events in eighteenth-century France.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A regent finds his family out of hand
- A conspiracy in Brittany tests a young man's oath
- An orphan is claimed by a mysterious family
- Dubois watches every move through his spies
- A stranger in the dark says he is her father
- The false duke and the would-be assassin
- Helene flees and Gaston goes to the Bastille
- The Breton plotters refuse to flee
- What the story is really about
Who’s who
- Gaston de ChanlayA young Breton gentleman chosen by lot to kill the regent, who falls in love with Helene and struggles to keep his oath.
- Helene de ChavernyA convent orphan, brave and proud, who is suddenly claimed by a secret family and refuses to abandon the man she loves.
- Philippe d'OrleansThe regent of France, kind and easily led, who meets Gaston in disguise and wants to protect Helene.
- Abbé DuboisThe regent's minister and master of spies, who plays false roles and believes that mercy is dangerous.
- Marquis de PontcalecLeader of the Breton conspirators, who believes a prophecy that he can only die by water.
- MontlouisA Breton conspirator and loving family man who fears that Dubois will have their blood.
- Madame DesrochesThe stern woman who guards Helene on the regent's orders and fears her growing will.
- TapinDubois's agent, who plays an innkeeper to watch over Gaston.
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- Audiobook
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- 15-minute summary
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- Hardcover
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- Large print paperback
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The Regent's Daughter
by Alexandre Dumas; Auguste Maquet · 1845
Gaston heads for Paris to kill the regent as Helene leaves her convent to meet a mysterious family.
Medium level5–10 hours to read25 languages
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In short
What would you do if a stranger in the dark called you his daughter, and the young man you love was sworn to kill the ruler of France? The Regent's Daughter is a historical novel by Alexandre Dumas and Auguste Maquet, set in Paris and Brittany in 1719.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A regent finds his family out of hand
The story opens in February 1719, when Philippe d'Orleans, regent of France, drives to Chelles Abbey with his clever minister, the Abbé Dubois. His daughter, the abbess, has turned the cloister into a place of balls and suppers. When the regent arrives, she answers with a show of piety and burns her cello and harpsichord in the courtyard.
The visit shows how the regent rules: he is easygoing and soft with his children, and Dubois is always at his elbow to remind him of the cost. The same night they learn that his elder daughter, the Duchesse de Berry, has secretly married her lover, the Chevalier de Riom, in a chapel at Meudon.
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What is The Regent's Daughter about?
It follows Gaston de Chanlay, a Breton conspirator sent to Paris to kill the regent, and Helene de Chaverny, the orphan he loves, whose mysterious family suddenly claims her.
Who is Abbé Dubois in the novel?
Dubois is the regent's clever minister and master of spies. He disguises himself as Captain la Jonquiere, plots against the conspirators, and pushes the regent to act harshly.
Is The Regent's Daughter a true story?
The novel presents the Breton conspiracy within a historical setting. It follows public affairs through a private story of love, secrecy and divided loyalty.
The author
Alexandre Dumas
1802–1870 · French novelist and playwright
Alexandre Dumas (1802–1870) was a French novelist and playwright. He was born in Villers-Cotterêts, lived in Paris, and died in Puys, near Dieppe. He wrote The Three Musketeers (1844), The Count of Monte Cristo (1844–1846), Twenty Years After (1845), and The Black Tulip (1850).
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