Juliette Benzoni

French author and international bestseller in several genres, including historical romance, historical fiction, mystery and screenwriting. In 1998, at the age of 78, she received the Chevalier de l'Ordre National (National Order of Merit) from President Jacques Chirac. Known as the "Queen of History Novels" and "Daughter of Alexander Dumas", she wrote 86 books, which were translated into at least 22 languages.

She married a doctor, Maurice Gallois in 1941, and they moved to Dijon where she became the mother of two children. While studying the history of Burgundy she discovered the Order of the Golden Fleece, which was later to inspire the seven Catherine novels. In 1950 her husband died of a heart attack, leaving her a widow at the age of 30 with two young children.

In Morocco she met a young French officer, Count André Benzoni di Conza from Corsica, and they married a few weeks before he was assigned to leave for Indochina to rejoin his regiment. Because of the unstable situation in Morocco, her husband wanted her to return to France, so in 1953 she went to live in the Parisian suburb of Saint-Mandé, where later her husband would become deputy mayor. Times were hard and she had to look for work, so she began employment as a journalist and author.

In 1982 her husband André Benzoni died, making her a widow for the second time. In January 1985 her son Jean-François Gallois died of a heart-attack, just like his father Maurice.

Juliette Benzoni died peacefully in her sleep on 7 February 2016 at age 95 in Saint-Mandé, with, her daughter Anne at her side.