Born into wealth amid the political and artistic foment of the Italian Renaissance, worldly and ambitious Isabella and naïve Beatrice d'Este, sisters and rivals, compete for the attentions of Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan.

The author of the bestselling Leonardo's Swans traverses the centuries into the hearts of two extraordinary women to reveal the passions, ambitions, and controversies surrounding the Elgin Marbles. The Elgin Marbles have been displayed in the British Museum for nearly two hundred years, and for just as long they have been the center of a raging controversy. In Stealing Athena, Karen Essex chronicles the Marbles' amazing journey through the dynamic...