The Queen's Soprano by Carol Dines

Angelica Volgia has a voice like no other. When she sings, she can make people burst with love, or weep with despair. But she lives in Rome in the 1680's, and the pope has outlawed any woman from performing (in any theatrical or musical sense) in public. So every morning Angelica sings behind the shutters of her room, and people gather in the street to listen to her "practice."

With the help of the maid, she learns that a young French sculptor has fallen in love with her, and they exchange notes in secret. If her mother knew they would be ripped apart forever.

You see, Angelica's mother is something of a fortune-hunter. She feels she was robbed of a good marriage when she was young, and is now determined that Angelica should marry far above her station, with her beautiful voice as the catalyst.

After her debut performance at a cardinal's palace, the suitors are lining up - cardinals, bishops, and other nobles visit her house. Some (the clergy) present other men as suitors. She despises them all, and she is already in love. She makes horrible nicknames, like Bishop Wet Lips and Prince Pimple Face.

When it seems that there is no other way to escape her mother's marrige schemes, she sends a plea for help to a friend and fellow singer who lives at the court of Queen Christina. Christina was a woman who abdicated the Swedish throne and came to Rome to convert to Catholicism. She had a houseful of artists and musicians that flew in the face of the current pope's laws about women performing in public.

So will Angelica escape her mother? Will she marry her woung suitor? Will the intrigues at court be her undoing?

THis was a pretty good novel. It felt a little choppy, but the historical details were well done, and the relationship Angelica had with her mother was really well done.