The empress of ice cream

Reading Group Questions for The Empress of Ice Cream

1. The Editor’s Note says that the two stories, Louise’s and Carlo’s, might seem ‘odd companions’. Did you find that to be the case? How did their narratives differ?

2. Were you surprised to discover that ice cream was invented in England? Did you find the historical background more or less interesting than other historical novels you have read?

3. Louise has to choose between the honourable marriage her parents brought her up to believe in, and becoming the king’s mistress in order to achieve her political aims. Do you think she made the right choice?

4. Cold - and its opposite, warmth - are recurrent themes in the book. Who are the coldest characters, and who did you warm to?

5. Which characters changed most over the course of the novel? What made them change?

6. Were Carlo’s relationships with the women in his life fair and equal?

7. What drove Louise to make the decisions she did?

8. How do Louise’s views on status and success compare to those of Hannah?

9. What disruptions to class relations have taken place in post-civil war England, and how do Carlo’s ideas about who should be allowed to eat ice cream reflect these changes?

10. How strongly does food influence events in the novel?

11. The Empress of Ice Cream moves from Italy to Erance and then to England. How does the change in setting reflect in the changes in the characters’ lives?

12. Is Louise a character you can easily empathise with?

13. Did The Empress of Ice Cream end the way you expected it to?

14. How did you think the epigraph from Wallace Stevens related to the story?

15. Do you think Carlo will end up finding happiness?

Acknowledgements

I am, once again, deeply indebted to my readers at AP Watt: Caradoc King, Elinor Cooper and Louise Lamont, and my editors Rebecca Saunders, at Litde, Brown, and Louise Davies, all of whom who helped me turn a book into a story.

Those who want to make the ice creams I describe should get lees: the Definitive Guide by Caroline Liddell and Robin Weir (also published as Frozen Desserts and The Ice Cream Book), which includes many recipes from old cookbooks. Traditional recipes are also available at www.historicfood.com. My greatest debt, however, is to the book which first gave me the idea for this novel: Elizabeth David’s Harvest of the Cold Months, a history of ice cream and ices.

Louise de Keroualle’s biography was first written by Henri Forneron under the title The Court of Charles II. It is not a particularly sympathetic account. ‘For fifteen years Louise de Keroualle held Great Britain in her delicate litde hand, and manipulated its king and statesmen . . . as she might have done her fan,’ is a fairly typical comment. The letters I use in Part Three between Colbert, Louvois and Louis XIV are taken direcdy from his translations.

Nell Gwyn’s descendant Charles Beauclerk has written a fascinating biography of his ancestor which describes the rivalry between the royal mistresses. My description of the game of Questioiis and Commands, at which Louise contrived to lose the clothes of herself and her ladiesin-waiting in order to induce Charles to prorogue Parliament, is taken from that book, although I moved the date by a year.

While many of the events in The Empress of Ice Cream took place as I describe, Louise de Keroualle’s ice palace is based on the one ordered by Empress Anna Ivanovna of Russia in 1740, described by Ivan Lazhechnkov in his book The Ice Palace.

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FRANCE 1670. Carlo pemirco’s

mastery of the exti aordinary new art of creating ice creams has brought him wealth, women, and a position at die court of Louis XIV. '

Then Carlo is sent to London, along with Louise de Keroualle, an impoverished lady-in-waiting. The most powerful ministers, of two countries have decided tliat Louise is to be Charles IPs new mistress, and will stop at nothing to make sure she submits.

But Carlo too is fascinated by the enigmatic Frenchwoman. With the king’s eveiy pleasme the subject of plots and betrayals, and Carlo’s only weapons his exquisite ice creams, soon he must decide . . . Where do his loyalties lie?

Praise for Anthony Capella

‘A gorgeous, sexy read diat will capture your imagination’. ‘Delicious, unashanedly feel-good’ The Times

‘Easily devoured in one sitting’ Observer

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mvw.an dionycapella.com

ISB^l 978-1-55278-875-2

McArthur & Company www.mcarthur-co.com ISBN 978-1-55278-875-2 $24.95

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