Charlotte Baird is an English heiress who is more interested in the new art of photography than the social obligations her family and status require of her. The Empress Elizabeth of Austria, known as Sisi, is beautiful and has an independent nature also and is bored by her life in the court of her much older husband Emperor Franz Joseph. Sisi visits England because she is an avid horsewoman and plans to participate in fox hunting season. Captain Bay Middleton is young, handsome and the best horseman in England. He is smitten with Charlotte and wants to marry her but her family disapproves because of his history as a womanizer. More complications ensue when Bay is given the job of being the Empress' pilot during the hunts. The Empress is known for always getting what she wants and what she wants is Bay. All in all it's a pretty typical love/break-up/reunite story but with the addition of horses and photographs. I was a bit disappointed in the ending and don't think this was as good a novel as Goodwin's previous one, The American Heiress. Once again there were a couple minor historical details that were in error like a character singing "Yankee Doodle Dandy" which did not become popular until 1904, three years after the death of Queen Victoria who is very much alive in this book.
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