I love Napoleonic tales, especially those with far-flung settings distant from Bonaparte’s seat of power in Paris. Having already read and loved Michelle Cameron’s Beyond the Ghetto Gates, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on a copy of Napoleon’s Mirage, its sequel. Michelle’s new release finds our heroine, Mirelle, ostracized—by the community, her best friend, even her mother—and labeled a “ruined woman.” As her efforts to nurture her family’s legacy are thwarted, she realizes she may have lost her last chance at love.

I was fortunate to attend two talks by Michelle in New York and couldn’t resist asking her a few questions and sharing everything I learned with you.

Q: Hi Michelle, welcome. Tell our readers a little bit about yourself and your writing.

Michelle: When I was about a third of the way through writing my first novel, which was published in 2009, I attended a writing conference and was challenged to say why I couldn’t finish my first draft.

My response—I had a full-time job, was mother to two young children, and needed to provide editing help to my husband as he worked toward his advanced degrees—had everyone in the group nodding. Everyone, that is, but the facilitator.

She had two questions for me. The first—after learning I was a morning person—was “how early can you get up?” The second, which resonated powerfully with me, was “how much do you want it?”

That second question has been a kind of motto for me, encouraging me to wake up every morning at 4:30 am to write, to weather disappointments in publishing and continue to persevere, to leave the security of a full-time job, and finally, to take a chance on partnering in a company that offers creative writing to everyone from children through teens and adults. I’m extremely proud of the writers I’ve helped along the way and the fact that I have five published books to my credit.

Q: Ancona, Italy is one of the settings for your latest book, Napoleon’s Mirage, which continues the story you began in Beyond the Ghetto Gates. You describe a moment of Jewish liberation under Napoleon that most of us haven’t heard of. What an amazing, unknown piece of history! What drew you to Bonaparte’s Italian campaign, specifically the city of Ancona, as a location for your novels?

Michelle: I set Beyond the Ghetto Gates in Ancona because it was the place where Napoleon first discovered that the Jewish population was locked behind ghetto gates from sundown to sunrise each day. I had never heard of this before. While researching this harbor city, I discovered that, at the time, it was the world center of illuminated ketubah (Jewish marriage certificate) creation and that there had been a miracle portrait of the Virgin Mother in the mountaintop cathedral there. These two facts became critical literary devices for the novel.

Q: Napoleon’s Mirage introduces another remarkable setting. In addition to the scenes in Ancona, it takes the reader to another chapter in the Napoleonic Wars, to Egypt. Tell me how you chose Egypt.

Michelle: Daniel and Christophe’s first story ended in Paris after Beyond the Ghetto Gates. I wanted their story to continue and became fascinated by Napoleon’s march into Egypt and Israel. During his attempt to cut off the British trade routes, he made many uncharacteristic mistakes, which foreshadowed his fatal errors in Russia. So much has been written about the Russian Campaign, and Egypt was the perfect setting for Daniel, once a hero‑worshipper of Napoleon, to grow disillusioned as he witnesses war’s harsh toll and moral compromises.

Q: The heroine, Mirelle, is both tradition‑bound and fiercely independent. In both Beyond the Ghetto Gates and Napoleon’s Mirage, she struggles to save her family business in Ancona, Italy, which creates illuminated Jewish marriage certificates, called ketubot. I’d love to know more about them.

Michelle: Mirelle, who has a talent for accounts, is trying to rescue the family business, which creates gorgeous ketubot. I discovered during research that Ancona was the center of illuminated ketubah production! That artistic legacy resonated deeply with me.

Q: Your characters evolve significantly between books. How have Mirelle, Daniel, and Christophe changed in Mirage?

Michelle: Christophe remains the bold, adventurous spirit of the first book, but he finds deeper purpose and even sacrifice. Mirelle faces ostracism back home and learns the cost of ambition — her mastery of the ketubah workshop is challenged by community backlash and heavy taxes. Daniel, as said above, became disillusioned with Bonaparte, which caused him to make some momentous, life-altering decisions.

Q: The title Napoleon’s Mirage is intriguing. What meaning did you want to capture?

Michelle: The French scientists with Napoleon coined the term “mirage” to describe optical illusions in the desert. Napoleon’s Egyptian mission itself was a mirage — a grand dream that ultimately was illusionary. The title reflects the alluring but deceptive nature of political and personal ambition.

Q: Both books weave religious tension — Jewish, Catholic, Muslim. What draws you to this interplay?

Michelle: It reflects the historical and personal complexities I live with. That kind of tension — duty versus love, tradition versus progress — is central to both Mirelle’s and Francesca’s narratives in Ghetto Gates, and has echoes in Mirage amid the clash of three religions in Egypt.

Q: You revise relentlessly. Give us a glimpse into your process.

Michelle: The first three months are devoted solely to research. Beyond that, drafting comes — but then major rewrites follow. Both Ghetto Gates and Mirage were revised multiple times. Ghetto Gates even had three different endings before beta‑reader insight — one suggestion, by my son Alex, led to the version published.

Q: How would you describe the emotional heartbeat of Napoleon’s Mirage?

Michelle: It’s a fusion of love, ambition, identity, and morality under a desert sun. We follow characters wrestling with warfare’s allure and fallout, interfaith connection and alienation, and the sheen of historical greatness that masks quiet personal tragedy. The Egyptian setting amplifies those tensions — beauty and brutality intertwined.

Q: What’s your current project?

Michelle: Right now, I’m immersed in a new novel set in Shakespeare’s London — again with Jewish/Converso themes unfolding behind the scenes.

Q: Finally, for readers stepping into Napoleon’s Mirage, particularly if they haven’t read Ghetto Gates, what’s your message?

Michelle: Mirage stands on its own — you can begin here, immersed in Egypt and Israel in 1799. But if you start with Ghetto Gates, you’ll deepen your bond with the characters, witness their silent vows, their fractures, and understand the roots of their journeys. Either way, expect immersive historical textures and human complexity.

Napoleon’s Mirage is available wherever books are sold; find links HERE. Dive in— these are stories that affirm, challenge, and linger long after the final page.

This month, I had the absolute pleasure of interviewing Jude Berman—historian, novelist, and all-around master of time travel (of the literary kind, that is). Her novel The Vow reimagines the life of 18th-century artist Angelica Kauffman, a name that deserves far more spotlight than it gets.

What follows is a warm, fascinating, and occasionally surprising conversation about art, ambition, and what it means to rewrite the past—just a little.

Q: First off, Jude—why Angelica Kauffman? What drew you to her story?

Jude: I stumbled across Angelica many years ago through a series of mystical coincidences and was immediately drawn in. She was talented and highly ambitious, and somehow managed to rise to prominence in a man’s world without becoming a cautionary tale. Her life was filled with drama—rags-to-riches fame, scandal, heartbreak—and yet, like so many early women artists, she was lost to history until quite recently. Even now most people don’t know who she is. I want to change that.

Q: The Vow reimagines parts of Angelica’s life. Where did you let fiction take the wheel?

Jude: For me, it’s a point of honor to stick closely to the known facts. Over the centuries, historians have come up with their own interpretations, and in the 19^th century—before Angelica was forgotten—a bestseller was written about her life. When I read it, and also read the actual letters she wrote to Wolfgang von Goethe, I was convinced that book got it wrong. So I set out to retell her story—still as fiction but reflecting what I believe to be closer to the truth of her heart.

Q: Historical fiction can be a tricky balancing act—how do you decide how much creative license to take?

Jude: It comes down to emotional truth. I wasn’t interested in writing a textbook—I wanted to explore what it felt like to be Angelica Kauffman: a woman with talent and ambition, navigating the art world, love, and the weight of expectations and then growing into maturity. I stuck with all the known facts of her life but let my creativity flow when it came to describing her inner world.

Q: Your descriptions of 18th-century London and Rome are gorgeously vivid. How deep did you dive into the research rabbit hole?

Jude: I did a lot of digging! And I have to say, my doctorate in educational research came in handy. I started pre-Internet, and more and more information became available as I was writing. I was constantly finding ways to pop in one or another detail as I discovered it. I probably know more about the price of pigments in 1775 than anyone needs to!

Q: Angelica was one of the founding members of the Royal Academy of Arts—a pretty big deal. Did you feel pressure to do her justice?

Jude: Absolutely. She was a trailblazer, and I didn’t want to flatten her into a sentimental figurehead. She was complicated. She made bold choices and also had to face disappointments and compromise. I wanted to honor both her strengths and her vulnerabilities.

Q: The novel explores how men in Angelica’s life tried to control or lay claim to her body, time, and talent. How did you approach writing these power dynamics?

Jude: Angelica lived in a world where men held virtually all the institutional and personal power. The law didn’t even permit a married woman to own her own paintings. Men naturally assumed they had access to Angelica—professionally, romantically, spiritually. I think it’s hard for women—especially younger women—today to imagine living with those constraints. I tried to show how the power dynamics of her time shaped her decisions, including the vows she made to herself and others.

Q: How did you balance portraying Angelica’s internal world with the historical record?

Jude: That’s one of the joys—and challenges—of historical fiction. The public record tells us where she lived, what she painted, whom she associated with. But her inner world? That’s an invisible layer. I leaned on her letters because they reflected her own thoughts. Her mind was, in many ways, her real canvas. I also drew on my own experience as an artist, especially with respect to how colors affect us.

Q: If Angelica were alive today, what do you think she’d make of The Vow?

Jude: I like to think she’d be intrigued—and maybe flattered. She might raise a skeptical eyebrow at some of the more speculative moments, but she was a portraitist, after all. She understood that every portrait—written or painted—blends truth and interpretation.

Q: Finally, what’s one thing you hope readers take away from The Vow?

Jude: That history isn’t just a list of dates and names—it’s full of beating hearts and difficult choices. And that women like Angelica Kauffman weren’t just muses or lovers or wives in a world of men. They were pioneers, and they can live on through our remembering of them.

The Vow is available wherever books are sold; find links HERE. If you love art, untold stories, or simply a beautifully crafted novel that will transport you—add it to your TBR. Trust me, Angelica’s world is one you’ll want to linger in.