Plots and Provocation

The Destiny Chronicles Book III: La Belle Époque

Part of The Destiny Chronicles

By Sherry A. Jones

A favorite of Paris high society, Lady Araminta Breconwood conceals a truth that could destroy her carefully constructed life. To secure the future of her son, Victor, she navigates the cosmopolitan world of Europe’s elite and a tangled web of deceit and conspiracies. She will let nothing stand in her way—even when the Seine River overflows, and her well-made plans go awry.Despite his wife’s deep misgivings, and at Tsar Nicholas II’s urging, Zsoltan Nikolayev agrees to leave St. Petersburg and his family to assume a diplomatic position in Paris, where he and Araminta reunite. Soon caught up in Dovosky’s French spy network and the Okhrana, the pair find themselves entrenched in the shadowy labyrinth of double-agents, blackmail, abduction, and assassins.After welcoming four daughters, Tsar Nicholas and Tsarina Alexandra celebrate the arrival of a son and heir to the Russian Empire. Their triumph is short-lived, however, when they realize Tsarevich Alexei has inherited the “bleeding disease” through his mother, one of Queen Victoria’s many granddaughters. At all costs, the Tsarevich’s affliction must be hidden from the eyes of the world. When the mystic Grigori Rasputin arrives in St. Petersburg and insinuates himself into the Tsarina’s confidence, the Romanov dynasty begins to unravel from within. In the years preceding the Great War, rapid advancements in aviation, armaments, and U-boats reshape the geopolitical landscape. Suffragette movements demand change in America and Britain, an elusive mole exists within the Kaiser’s inner circle, and the desperation of the Russian populace reaches a boiling point. An arms race between rival empires sets the stage for a catastrophic upheaval that will shatter the global order.Plots and Provocation, Book III of The Destiny Chronicles, delivers a riveting tale of international espionage and intergenerational intrigue during La Belle Époque, the period marked by joie de vivre throughout Europe prior to the Great War. Inspired by true events, this gripping novel weaves rich history and scandalous romance into a thrilling drama, sweeping readers from glittering Parisian drawing rooms to the edge of a perilous abyss as our characters strive to maintain peace in an unstable world.The adventure continues in Pillars of Power, when Germany’s ruthless attack on Belgium in 1914 sparks the commencement of the Great War.