This was a very comprehensive biography on the Borgia siblings. However, I have read many biographies on these infamous Borgias and this novel does not present anything new. It was mostly a rehash of what I already know. Thus, this biography is not for those who are familiar with the Borgias but those who do not know much about them.

I know very little about the Borgias and found this book to be an excellent introduction. It began with the rise of the Borgia family and then focused on Cesare and Lucrezia and their relationship which has been much maligned over the years. Truly fascinating.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free e-copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

Thank you NetGalley for the eARC. I am a huge history fan and it did bother me to think these two were incestuous but this book showed they were just loving siblings. I enjoyed that

Cesare and Lucrezia are two of the most fascinating siblings in history and i loved learning more about them and their life. There's so much rumour surrounding them i liked learning a more objective and fact based account of them.

This book is well researched and well written. The level of detail included is quite remarkable. After reading it I felt I’d learnt a lot about the period and Cesare in particular. The subject matter is tricky and complex but the author weaved a clear and informative tale. Excellent.

A decent look at two family members of the Italian Renaissance that you will likely see in any book about it. Good for those who have an interest in the Borgia's and want to look at either one of them.

First line: In the small town of Borja, near Zaragoza in Spain, there were a large number of households who used the name ‘de Borja’.

Summary: Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia are remembered for many dark deeds during their time but most of what we “know” is not actually based on fact. They were not the incestuous siblings or murderers of enemies with poison. Samantha Morris gives us a look into the lives of the two most famous Borgias and how they got the reputation that still follows them, 500 years later.

My Thoughts: I first learned about the Borgia family from reading The Borgia Bride by Jeanne Kalogridis. I loved the story of this notorious family. And then I fell in love with the TV show The Borgias on Starz. I knew that much of it was for TV or rumors surrounding the family but it made for good watching and intrigue.

I liked how the author started with the original rise of the family. I knew that the family was Spanish but to hear how tied to Spain they were was new to me. The politics of the time and the way the Pope had so much control is astounding. He controlled kings, armies and much of Italy. Today it seems like the Pope has very limited range and mainly sticks to religious issues. But I am not Catholic so my knowledge is very limited.

My favorite part was the time after the death of Alexander. I was not familiar with this time in their lives so I learned a lot. Cesare was a military genius. Lucrezia married multiple times and led a very religious life. I was happy to read more about them and find out how their stories ended.

FYI: I would recommend this for someone looking for the truth behind the drama.

History is written by the victors, and the for Borgias this appears to be particularly so. Vilified as incestuous, corrupt and violent, a family to be feared, their name has come down through the ages as a synonym for bad behaviour. The author sets out to prove this is not the full story and she does make a good argument.

According to her research, there is virtually no evidence that Cesare and Lucrezia were lovers. They were very much a product of their age, when men were expected to be strong and actions had to be taken to keep property or land which today would be frowned upon. However, despite some cruelty, Cesare was a respected war lord, he unified his dependencies and his vassals prospered under him. He was promiscuous, and did contract syphilis, but this was rife throughout the area at this time. Lucrezia was loved by her people, she married three times and had numerous pregnancies, particularly by her third husband, although she lost nearly all the children early on or as miscarriages. She was a pious woman, a good regent and while perhaps not always a strictly faithful wife, she lived well by her standards.

They were both Spaniards living in Italy, thrust into the limelight by their father Pope Alexander, and determined to improve the standing of their family at every opportunity, regardless of cost. They both had a strong sense of family and were clearly close.

The story the author portrays is quite sad really; both were buffeted by events over which they had little control. If Cesare had not ingested the poison that killed his father he would have been in a much better position to defend himself. Lucrezia had husbands found for her, she was not allowed to choose.

The book is well researched and my only complaint would be the use of some colloquial language which does not sit well in an academic book as well as some clumsy sentence structures. There were plenty of quotes from contemporary sources to back up the arguments being made.

The author brings the story up to date, detailing how Cesare and Lucrezia have been portrayed by Hollywood and modern films as well as detailing what happened to their descendents.

Overall a detailed account of the lives of two very interesting characters.

Thank you to NetGalley and Pen & Sword History for allowing me access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Wow, this took me a while. It's a very interesting book, well researched, and you can just feel Samantha Morris' passion for the theme while reading, but it is also very dense, full of information in each page, so it wasn't as quick as I had expected.

The book starts with quite a bit of background information on the Borgia family, and how Cesare and Lucrezia's father, Rodrigo Borgia, rose to power and became Pope Alexander VI, as well as his schemes to use his children to gain more power through Italy (still not unified). We get to see the starts of Cesare's career in the church, then moving on to military and political conquests, while Lucrezia lives through different marriages and hard pregnancies.

"The epitaph on the tomb certainly describes Cesare as he was - a man of both peace and war."

Through the book we also receive information on the other things happened across Europe (mainly Spain and France, since they were closer to the Borgia family and Italy as a whole), which I think was important to understand all of Cesare's choices during his life. Most of it is focused on him, until his death, when Morris focuses on Lucrezia and her family situation, and the danger they faced with military attacks.

"She [Lucrezia] was vilified as an incestuous harlot who poisoned her enemies yet the truth was that she was a simple, pious woman who loved her family deeply. Her only crime was to be born a Borgia, their name and actions both real and imagined, tainting her even after death."

Some of the writing feels a bit rushed, like "this happened and then this and this person did this" without any pauses, but it didn't bother me during reading, I think. Morris tried really hard to show that Cesare and Lucrezia didn't have any kind of romantic or sexual relationship, which yes very valid and important to show what is true and what could've been intrigue created by their enemies and perpetuated still today (there's a chapter by the end of the book on modern media and how they show the siblings' relationship), but it was also funny because it's like... Cesare wasn't into incest, but he definitely was an evil little man who murdered a bunch of people.

(I can't judge, I thought he was cool even before learning about the truth through this book. Now I just think Cesare is cooler. And I've learned to appreciate Lucrezia a lot more as well.)

By the end of the book, there's also some pictures of art of the Borgia family, as well as photography of the cities and places mentioned through it. Which I really appreciate, because it's hard to create a mental image of how Italy was in the 1400~1500s without knowing how it's like today lol.

An absorbing read, concentrating on the Borgia siblings, scions of one of the most powerful families of the Italian
renaissance. You cannot visit Rome or Florence and not be aware of the influence that this notorious family had on political life. Very interesting.

This book was most interesting. Not my usual read but I've always been interested in history and I feel that this book has educated me on the borgias. Thank you to the publishers for granting me a copy!

It's nice to read a book which mentions the Borgia's without resorting to grand Guignol. I would recommend this for the general reader, as it is a bit light on the history and politics of the time. There is no real sense of why the Papacy was trying to reassert its control of the Papal states or why Naples had become so important.

A family mired in myths and rumors of incest, murder, and intrigue for centuries. A brother and sister caught in the middle, attracting the attention of gossips and historians alike. No, I am not referring to a royal family in England. In fact, this story starts in Spain with Alonso de Borja, who moved to Italy and helped create the infamous Borgia family. Caught in the middle were the son and daughter of Rodrigo Borgia, Alonso’s nephew, and his mistress Vanozza Cattanei; Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia. How close were these famous siblings? What were their lives really like? In Samantha Morris’ latest biography, “Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia: Brother and Sister of History’s Vilified Family”, she dives deep into the archives to find out the truth about the legendary Borgia family.

I would like to thank Pen and Sword Books and NetGalley for sending me a copy of this book. I will be honest and say that I did not know much about this family before I started reading this book. I knew about the rumors and that they had to do with the papacy, but that was it. I was excited to learn more about them and to understand why so many people are so fascinated with the Borgia siblings.

To understand how the Borgias rose to power, Morris takes her readers on a journey through papal history and the many different councils that occurred in the 14th and 15th centuries. This was familiar to me as I took a class in college on Church History, in which we did discuss these councils, but for those who are not familiar with them, Morris takes the time to explain the significance of each event. We see how Alonso de Borja rose through the ranks to become Pope Calixtus III and how his nephew, Rodrigo Borgia, was the complete opposite of his uncle. Rodrigo, later Pope Alexander VI, was a ladies man, and his children by his mistress, Vanozza Cattanei, were all illegitimate, including Cesare and Lucrezia.

It is the lives of Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia that historians, including Morris, tend to focus on. These siblings created so many enemies that rumors were bound to be associated with them. From incest between them to murder using poison, and numerous affairs, Cesare and Lucrezia endured scandals that made the Tudors look like a normal family. Morris takes on each myth and rumor head on to explore the truth about these siblings, which is of course more complex than the fictional tales of their lives.

I found myself enthralled in the true-life tales of Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia. Like most historical tales, the truth is much more compelling than the fictitious tales. The trials, triumphs, and tribulations of the siblings are so compelling and to realize that they lived when the Renaissance in Italy and the Tudor dynasty was still new in England is remarkable.

This book made me fall in love with the Borgia family. The story of their rise to greatness and what Cesare and Lucrezia had to endure to protect their family and its name was nothing short of extraordinary. Samantha Morris’s writing style is easy to understand but you can tell how much care she took in researching these simply sensational siblings. I want to study the Borgia family even more because of this book. If you want an engrossing nonfiction book about the Borgia family, I would highly suggest you read, “Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia: Brother and Sister of History’s Most Vilified Family” by Samantha Morris. A fabulous introduction to the Borgias and their tumultuous times.

Samantha Morris's book is a readable account of the lives of Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia, which attempts to present these two remarkable people in an objective light and to prove the awful rumours about them - murder, poison, incest and so on - were false.
I think the author was quite successful in her intent. She explains the political situation well and proves that there really weren't sound bases for the rumours about the Borgia, apart from the hatred of their enemies. I also liked the fact that, with Cesare in particular, she doesn't overly justify his most awful actions, but also highlights his remarkable talents, making him an overall complex and fascinating figure.
However, her theory is not always spelled out clearly, but she tends to relate the events one after another, often without much commentary, and this made the read a little dry and boring at times. I wished she had taken more time to analyze the people and the situations. Also, I wished more time was spent on Lucrezia's life. I felt like she only came into real focus after her father and her brother were dead. I guess this was because her life was less eventful than theirs, but she still had to face a lot of dire challenges, and I would have liked to see more of her.
In the end there is also a chapter where Morris discusses the Borgia in the modern culture, such as in books, tv shows and so on, which is very interesting.
All in all, a good read, even if a little dry, but I would recommend it.

I liked this! It dispelled a lot of scandalous “history” with real facts. I liked the history of the Borgia family and the various regions of Italy. The final chapter that talked about the various media depictions about the family through the years was also interesting. If this is an area of history you are interested in, or if you want to see how rumors and innuendo can continue for so many centuries, I would recommend this book!

I received an advanced readers copy from the publisher and Netgalley in return for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and Pen and Sword for kindly providing me with a digital copy of this book for review.
I was delighted to receive a copy of this book as I have read a few Pen and Sword published works that I have really enjoyed and found very informative.
I had first encountered the Borgia family in Sarah Dunant’s fiction novels about this family. I very much enjoyed those books, but you always question in the back of your mind just how much of these lives have been fictionalised when you read a novel based on an actual life or event. I was relieved to read in this book that the author feels that Dunant’s novels were well researched and come pretty accurate to actual events.
I really found this book very informative. I think the author gave a fair but sensitive approach to the Borgia siblings- there’s no getting away from the murder, power plotting, and sexual misdemeanours that went on around them. However, the author does a good and well backed up argument, using primary and secondary evidence, that shows a lot of the scandal and hinted incest was most likely spread by Borgia enemies who were deliberately trying to discredit them.
A really fascinating read that I think will look stunning in physical print as well. There are some wonderful pictures at the end of this digital review copy that really help to set the scene and give a possible face to some of the names. Highly recommend.

Fascinating study of Cesar and Lucrezia which effectively dispels many of the more lurid myths surrounding the famous Borgia siblings.

This book has turned out to be a mixed bag for me. I was eager to learn more about two of the most (in)famous members of the Borgia-family, which was the reason why I requested it. The author does a good job describing the rise of the Borgias (originally known by their Spanish name as the de Borjas) inside the Catholic church with Alfons de Borja, who step by step went from being a professor of law to becoming a diplomat for the Kings of Aragon, then cardinal, and finally being elected Pope Calixtus III in 1455. He nominated his nephew Rodrigo Borgia cardinal, and in 1492 Rodrigo was elected pope himself under the name of Alexander VI. Cesare and Lucrezia were the best-known if his four illegitimate children he had with his lover Vannozza dei Cattanei. It’s on their lives that this book focused on.

As much as the book does provide great quantities of useful information about the main protagonists of the Borgia-family, I was in places overwhelmed by it. I think a steadier, less rushed pace of telling their stories could have improved the flow of the historical narrative. As it were, I had the overall impression that the author herself was overpowered and swept away by the sheer amount of details, so much so that she gushed through the data and evidence, afraid to leave anything out. Some arguments she makes are not explained satisfactorily and end in strange take-it-or-leave-it non-sequiturs. The writing style didn’t help either; someone should have made the effort to thoroughly proofread the manuscript. Proofreading would have avoided factual errors such as writing “off the coast of Belgrade” (the distance between the Adriatic and the Serbian capital is over 400 km) or tautological sentences such as “he was sufficiently recovered enough…”. It would have allowed countless hyphens to be added where they are needed (father-in-law, for instance; I encountered “father in law” as well as “fatherinlaw” and synonyms could have been used instead of the (again) countless repetitions of words, often in the same sentence. Hopefully, proofreading would also have corrected grammar mistakes such as “the narrative of both books concentrate” (when it should have been “concentrates”).

On the positive side, the author has reached her goal, which was to show that the bad name the Borgias still suffer from today is mostly due to propaganda and rumours spread by their enemies, of which they had plenty. She succeeds in showing not two paragons of Evil who indulged in incest and in poisoning their enemies left, right, and centre, but two people who simply tried to live their lives in an age and a “country” where that wasn’t so easy to do, especially for two siblings whose father was a much-hated man of immense power. She handles them with empathy, but not with smitten blindness; their dark sides are explored and explained (yes, most powerful people back then didn’t shy away from committing what we today would call crimes). It’s for this aspect that I didn’t totally dislike the book and would give it a note above average.

Whilst I was aware of the Borgia's I have never read much about them but recently I've been expanding my historical reading and interests outside of my usual scope so I was intrigued by this book from Samantha Morris who aims to dispel the rumours of incest murder and poisoning.

I will hold my hand up and admit I have watched the TV show so had a little understanding of who they were and the rumours surrounding them.

Whilst the title is self explanatory and Morris does focus on the siblings the rest of the family are by no means excluded. I was absorbed in to this book from the first page! Yes, its nonfiction but Morris' writing style makes it so easy to read.

The initial chapters focus on the background of the family, who they were and their rise to power before starting to focus on the siblings and the events that have led to them still being discussed hundreds of years later.

From the dispelling of rumours to the true stories of their successes and failings I am now very interested in reading more about the family.

I thoroughly enjoyed how Morris explains where rumours regarding the family such as incest and poison originated from and how they have been presented in modern day media. Morris analyses media such as the TV show and explains which are most historically correct.

Cesare led a very interesting albeit short life and seems to have been very successful as a soldier although clearly made a few enemies along the way. His journey from cardinal to a Duke and captain of the papal army is extremely interesting and an area i would like to read more about.

Lucrezia, often depicted as a woman who is not averse to using poison is portrayed as a pious woman who seems to have had affairs but also faced much grief in her life but who was loved by her people and had many admirers. Whilst she clearly loved her family I read nothing that gives me the impression their relationship was anything other than a normal sibling relationship.

The book is referenced throughout providing me with more reading to now follow up with in my newly found interest of the Borgia's.

Between the TV show and reading this my opinion has changed of the family and I find myself admiring them in particular Lucrezia, whilst she may have had faults she faced a lot of heartbreak and enemies, her story is actually really sad.

As a newcomer to the Borgia's I found this book incredibly informative and interesting but I'm unsure if it would provide anything new to those who have already read or studied them. This book is clearly the result of much research and Morris obviously has a passion for the subject evident throughout which I think is part of the reason I found the book so engaging.

I would have liked to read more about specific battles Cesare faced and whether Lucrezia was ever caught out for her letters she sent but as an introduction to the family and the siblings I can't fault this book and would highly recommend to those who would like to learn more about this intriguing family.

The first few chapters begin with a detailed account of the origins of the Borgia family. The author aims to portray the real life facts of Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia, and dispel some of the incest/poison/murder rumours, that have been portrayed throughout history. This book certainly shows a different side to their characters.
It was interesting to see what Cesare achieved in his somewhat short lifetime ( he died aged 31).
He was a fearless soldier and spent a large part of his life fighting for what he thought was right and aiming to be the best soldier he could. This military career was tied up with the church and the corruption of the day, between the warring families, is evident to see. Again it is difficult to determine between fact and rumour.
Lucrezia, often portrayed as a calculating incestuous poisoner , suffered a great deal of grief during her lifetime. The author describes how Lucrezia was pregnant for most of her married life and suffered many miscarriages and stillbirths. But she remained a strong determined woman who was loved by her people and admired by many. The incest rumours that have become synonymous with Cesare and Lucrezia are briefly addressed in the book, and some evidence given that the rumours were probably started by their enemies to discredit the family. But disappointingly there is hardly any detail or description of their lives together or their close relationship so it is difficult to make a judgment
The author has obviously undertaken a great deal of research for this book and this is shown in the detailed accounts and dates covering many years. But I did get confused with all the family names (there were so many!) and I lost track of the relationships.
I was hoping to find out far more about the “real” Cesare and Lucrezia, as the title suggests this book is about them. But I was disappointed with the lack of detail about their personal lives, characters and relationship . There was no in depth look into their lives , relationships, feelings and interaction . It is more of a general observation of key events in their later lives, which somehow get lost in the overall narrative of the warring families fighting for power.
It would have been helpful if the ages of Cesare and Lucrezia were stated at main points in the story. I had to constantly look back to try and calculate this which detracted from text. They seemed to have encountered so many things in a short space of time that it was difficult to keep track of their ages.
The photographs at the end of the book, relating to various places mentioned in the text were very interesting.
If you enjoy historical facts you will probably enjoy this book. But it is hard going in places and I found it lacked the personal, detailed elements of Cesare’s and Lucrezia’s lives and relationships that I was hoping for, and what the title had implied.
The author should be admired for the amount of research that obviously went into this book and it spurred me on to find out more about the real Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia.