title: The Purple and the Gold
author: Daniels, Dorothy
description: Vienna -- 1912
  
  The most glittering capital of Europe, where an aging Emperor ruled an empire riddled with intrigue and violence, while his court pursued an endless round of public pageantry and private pleasures.
  
  This was the city of grandeur and corruption in which ravishingly lovely young Magda Karoly came of age. From her gallant and doomed father she inherited a title and a mission. From her notorious courtesan mother came the art of sensual seduction. In the dazzling ballrooms and soft-shadowed bedrooms she learned the power and the peril of her beauty -- as she was swept toward the lover who would give her her ultimate test as a woman, and the gamble that could save her world...