This first-ever biography of Harriet de Boinville explores her close relationships with Mary Shelley, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and other leading writers of the Romantic era, but also tells the gripping story of Harriet's early years as the wife of an aristocratic military officer during the French-English Wars, when she experienced a naval attack in the Caribbean, a shipwreck off the coast of France, and detention as a suspected spy in Dunkirk.

Combining literary history and gender study with the engaging story of a courageous and caring woman, this ground-breaking book has generated extraordinary praise from renowned authors and experts.