From back cover: An enigmatic monarch, a flamboyant and unpredictable intellectual, a woman eager for knowledge, and a feminist before her time, Queen Christina of Sweden reigned over an empire she intended to make the most sophisticated in all of Europe. ... Rather than bow to pressure and conform to the expectations of a nation that demanded she give it an heir, Christina abdicated her throne to convert to Catholicism. Was this an act of madness? Or a bold gesture of autonomy by a modern woman born out of her time -- one whom the 17th century simply could not contain.