The Fact and Fiction Behind Jacquette and Oscar’s First Meeting at Drottningholm

Posted on July 4, 2026 in Butterfly Games, Jacquette

On July 4, as America celebrates its 250th birthday, I’m thinking about another pair of birthdays—two young people born on the same day, two years apart, whose lives would become entangled in one of those relationships that history remembers. Jacquet…

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Axel von Fersen’s Last Days: Marie Antoinette, Jacquette’s Aunt Emilie, and the Real History Behind the Butterfly Games Prequel, The Marshal’s Warning

Posted on June 4, 2026 in Butterfly Games, Jacquette, Monthly Blog

If you have watched the BBC/Canal+ series Marie Antoinette—or seen it on PBS Masterpiece—you may have wondered about the handsome Swedish aristocrat who captured the queen’s heart. I’m Kelly Scarborough, author of Butterfly Games, a historical novel…

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What if the scandal wasn’t the whole story?

Posted on April 30, 2026 in Butterfly Games, Characters, Jacquette, Newsletter

  When I first came across Jacquette Gyldenstolpe, I wasn’t struck by what history said about her. I was struck by what it didn’t. Here was a woman who lived at the center of power in early 19th-century Sweden—a countess moving in royal circles,…

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