Day of betrayal

What happens to the relationship between two people when a third wheel, uncontrollable, enters the picture?

In his new novel François-Guillaume Lorrain vividly depicts the fatal triangle formed by king Louis XIII, his Prime Minister Richelieu, and a young troublemaker, the Marquis de Cinq-Mars.

King Louis XIII is under the yoke of his prime minister Richelieu, who for 20 years has held the reins of a France threatened by an outside enemy, Spain, and internal enemies, the great lords. Enter the Marquis of Cinq-Mars, a young elegant twenty-year-old, appointed by Richelieu to watch over – in other words spy on – the king and become his confidant.

Things were already tense between the king and his cardinal: Richelieu complains of the cold lunacy of a sovereign in decline; Louis XIII complains about a minister who spies on him and curbs his power. Cinq-Mars, an ambitious man adored by women, will soon rebel against his creator, Richelieu, and climb the rungs of power at a dizzying speed, devising plots that put the very existence of the divided and fragile kingdom in peril. For this conspiracy, he’ll pay with his life.

The tragedy of a solitary power undermined by mistrust and paranoia
A fatal triangle at the head of the state