The Monastery, the Unlikely King

Portugal, 1479
The death of King Henry IV plunged the Kingdom of Castile into a severe succession crisis, sparking an armed conflict with the neighboring Crown. On one side were the supporters of Isabella, the monarch's legitimate sister; on the other, Joanna, the bastard daughter, who had married her uncle, the King of Portugal, to secure her claim to the throne.

At a time when a country's foreign policy power was measured by the influence of marriage, peace in the Iberian Peninsula was left in the hands of two young princes—Prince Afonso of Portugal and the eldest child of Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile.

But it was then that the whims of history placed two other children in their path: João, the disowned son of an abbot, who dreamed of impossible structures, and the youngest descendant of a powerful family, whose ambition caused their destinies to intertwine in the construction of the greatest masterpiece of Portuguese architecture.

Inspired by the historical events surrounding the construction of the Jerónimos Monastery, The Monastery, The Unlikely King is Nuno Nepomuceno's surprising debut in historical fiction. A grand narrative set in medieval Europe and simultaneously a masterful recreation of a fascinating era, where love and betrayal weave a thrilling plot, full of emotion, romance, and tragedy, that will captivate you until the very last page.