Jehanne Wake & Katie Wake

Forgotten women brought vividly back to life.

Name: The Countess
ISBN: 9781804183717

Mother and daughter historians writing rich, elegant biographies of power, society and the women history tried to overlook.

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The Countess book cover by Jehanne Wake and Katie Wake

The Authors

Jehanne Wake & Katie Wake

A mother-and-daughter writing partnership bringing forgotten women and hidden histories vividly back to life.

Jehanne Wake

Biographer and historian

Author of Princess Louise and Sisters of Fortune, with critical acclaim from the Sunday Times to the New York Times. Contributor to BBC radio, television and the Oxford New Dictionary of National Biography.

Katie Wake

Historian and adviser

Read history at Bristol and Oxford. Former senior policy adviser in the British government and managing partner of an international advisory firm. This is her first book.

Featured Book

The Countess

Seduction, power and the extraordinary life of Emily Cowper

New Biography

The Countess

Seduction, power and the extraordinary life of Emily Cowper

Published 25 June 2026 · Ithaka · Hardback £25 · Kindle £7.99 · Audiobook · Paperback £16.99

A spellbinding biography of Emily, Countess Cowper — Regency beauty, ambitious socialite and Victorian powerbroker. Written with novelistic richness and extraordinary detail from intimate letters and journals.

Hardback ISBN 9781804183717 · Paperback ISBN 9781804183724

Pre-order at Waterstones Pre-order at Amazon Request event

Praise

Early words for The Countess

“The resurrection of a remarkable woman erased from history”

Katy Hessel

author of The Story of Art Without Men

“A triumph: a richly sympathetic portrait of a fascinating aristocratic woman.”

David Kynaston

author of Tales of a New Jerusalem

“A very clever woman”

Queen Victoria

on Emily Cowper

In the Press

The Sunday Times

“No one will believe you” — attempted rape cover-up detailed for the first time in The Countess

New archival research by Jehanne Wake, featured in The Sunday Times, reveals the suppression of an attempted assault involving Lord Palmerston and one of Queen Victoria’s ladies-in-waiting.

The Sunday Times · June 2026