Excerpts from the Imperial Diary

Empress Sisi is still youthful, gorgeous, and desired by many. She is loved and honored by her husband, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria-Hungary, but all too soon they are hit by tragedies they are powerless to prevent.

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Although the King pays for his pet projects with his own funds, it does not spare Bavaria from financial ruin. Feeling harassed and irritated by his ministers, King Ludwig considers dismissing the entire cabinet and replacing them with fresh faces. However, the cabinet members agree to act first. Seeking a cause to depose their King by constitutional means, the rebelling Bavarian ministers decide on the rationale that he is mentally unfit and therefore unable to rule.

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They ask Ludwig's uncle, Prince Luitpold, to step into the royal vacancy once the monarch is removed. Luitpold agrees, on the condition that the conspirators produce solid proof that the King is indeed insane. Then King Ludwig II loses his life under mysterious circumstances. Was it suicide or is someone strategically eliminating members of the House of Wittelsbach?

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The sudden, and violent death of Sisi’s only son, Crown Prince Rudolph at his hunting lodge Mayerling, shakes the Monarchy to its core. And the fact that the dead body of his teenaged mistress is found right next to his completes the scandal. How will the imperial couple cope with this devastating loss? Does this tragedy mark the end of the Danube monarchy, since Rudolph only had a daughter? And will their love and faith in each other allow Sisi and Franz Joseph to master these difficult trials?