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Rating: 
Summary: Captivating HerStory
Review: I first learned about Sissi during my senior year of high school when my German teacher had a connection with someone in the international airline biz and could get her students back issues of German magazines like "Der Spiegel" and "Gala." I grabbed an issue of Gala and there was the most enchanting woman on the cover. It turned out to be Romy Schneider and the magazine was celebrating the 100th anniversary of Sissi's death.I was utterly FASCINATED, reading about her life, her beauty cult, her self-abusive trials with anorexia and bulimia, her marriage to the emperor, and so forth. A few years later, I got the chance to study abroad in Austria and hat the opportunity to visit actual historical Sissi-related sites. When I got back to the US for my senior semester of college, I took a women's studies course and did a paper of the Austro-Germanic Beauty Cult surrounding Empress Elisabeth of Austria. This, along with my personal experiences in Austria and Hamann's book, provided me with a plethora of information about Elisabeth. But what made me truly appreciate this book was the way that the author presented the material. This book read like a novel. I feel that Haslip provided a very well rounded amount of historical material that doesn't feel one-sided (very pro-Elisabeth or focusing solely on how beautiful she was). If you're interested in a different "princess story," this empress will captivate you!
Rating:
Summary: Reads more like a novel than a biography
Review: I was somewhat reluctant to first start reading The Lonely Empress because, from the some of the biographies I've read (but not certainly not all!), they tend to start out interesting but then become dull and boring. It usually takes a talented author to write a biography on a boring royal. But even an unskilled author would have no trouble about sounding fascinating if their subject matter was Elizabeth of Austria. Born a mere daughter of a duke in Bavaria, Elizabeth had a fairytale (ish) romance. The emperor of Austria, Francis Joseph, was already engaged to Elizabeth's sister Helen when he fell in love with her. All of a sudden, to everyone's surprise, the Emperor started to rant about the grace and beauty of this younger sister, much to the dismay of his mother, the archduchess Sophie, who thought that Helen would become the perfect empress. Elizabeth was still a child when she became engaged to the Emperor. Suddenly, she wasn't allowed to run wild, like she had been when she was younger. Elizabeth had been known to skip her lessons and go out riding for hours. Her father, Duke Max, was known for his strangeness. He was known to travel the Bavarian countryside to escape his duties and delighted in circuses. The poor Duchess Ludovica, Elizabeth's mother, must have had a terrible time with her daughter and equally childish husband. Elizabeth inherited her father's peculiarity and was known to be her happiest when surrounded by less than royal people. Because of this she was looked down upon at court by the snobbish Viennese. This woman traveled to countries far away so she could escape her duties as an Empress and her husband. What makes this book more interesting is how the author has portrayed Elizabeth. She doesn't try to make Elizabeth into a selfish, spoiled woman yet she doesn't spend the whole book describing her flawless beauty. Elizabeth seems to be a difficult topic to write about. As many people who have met the Empress say about her throughout the book, "She could be quite charming when she wanted to be. Yet she could also become cold and haughty." Elizabeth has you admiring her at times, like when she tries to help the Hungarian people regain their Constitution, and at other times hating her, the way she treated her husband and children. The woman whose husband spent fortunes building her three homes around Europe and who still wasn't grateful or satisfied. But one feels for Elizabeth at how much misfortune she had dealt with in her life. She seems to be a caged bird, she seems to have those natures that cannot be trapped or caged. She needed wide spaces so she can spread her wings. The author portrayed Elizabeth excellently and made the book an enjoyable read.
Rating: 
Summary: Well written biography of Sissi
Review: Prior to visiting Vienna last summer, I hadn't known much about Elizabeth of Austria or Sissi as she was often called. Seeing Schonbrunn and the Hofburg made me curious to learn more about her, and this book certainly makes for interesting reading. The author provides details not only about Elizabeth and her family, but also about the politics of the day. Elizabeth comes across as a study in contrasts: on the one hand, she could be very charming and gracious, on the other hand she appears to have been fundamentally self-centered and unsuited for the duties of an Empress. Wrapped up in her own pursuits, obsessed by the thought of gaining weight, growing old and losing her beauty, she was restless, possessive and prone to depression. At the end of the book, I felt much more sympathy for the Emperor Franz Joseph who loved Sissi to her dying day, despite the many separations he endured that were caused by her constant wandering around Europe and despite her unwillingness or inability to perform the duties traditionally expected of an Empress. Overall, this is a well-written biography, and my only caveat would be that Haslip sometimes makes allusions, for example regarding Elizabeth's illness, that are not fully explained which can be frustrating for the reader.
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