Susan Ronald

AUTHOR, HISTORIAN AND BIOGRAPHER

In every ‘history’ lurks the word ‘story’. I am an historian, but above all, I am a storyteller. It is in the unearthing of known, or as yet undiscovered, stories about people and the events they make—or which shape them—that I find so fascinating. Join me on my journey to illuminate some of the people who made their stories into history from the 16th to 20th centuries.

Hitler's Aristocrats: The Secret Power Players in Britain and America Who Supported the Nazis, 1923–1941

The acclaimed author of Hitler’s Art Thief takes readers into the shadowy world of the aristocrats and business leaders on both sides of the Atlantic who secretly aided Hitler and Nazi Germany. Hitler said, ‘I am convinced that propaganda is an essential means to achieve one’s aims.’

Enlisting Europe’s aristocracy, international industrialists, and the political elite in Britain and America, Hitler spun a treacherous tale everyone wanted to believe: he was a man of peace. Central to his deception was an international high society Black Widow, Princess Stephanie Hohenlohe-Waldenburg-Schillingsfürst, whom Hitler called ‘his dear princess.’ She, and others, conspired for Hitler at the highest levels of the British aristocracy and spread their web to America’s wealthy powerbrokers.

All Books

Hitler's Aristocrats

The Ambassador

Condé Nast

A Dangerous Woman

Hitler's Art Thief

Heretic Queen

The Pirate Queen

The Sancy Blood Diamond

France, The Crossroads of Europe

Notable Reviews

Ronald’s group portrait of people of great wealth — their expensive squabbles over inheritances and divorce settlements, their disinclination to pay taxes (Frank skipped out on paying federal income taxes for more than 30 years), their ability to manipulate people in power, all in the service of adding even more zeros to their bank accounts — is breathtaking and quite modern.

- A Dangerous Woman, New York Times Tweet

Ronald situates Gurlitt’s life and career amid the turmoil of Weimar Germany and then the evolution of Nazi art-looting campaigns from the late 1930s to the end of World War II, [adding] many new details about Gurlitt’s dealings.

- HItler's Art Thief, Wall Street Journal Tweet

In this companion volume to Ronald’s study of the life and times of England’s Elizabeth I [The Pirate Queen], the author sets the Elizabethan age within the context of the Catholic-Protestant wars of religion that flared across Europe throughout the latter half of the 16th century. Ronald deftly pulls together a vast amount of historical research into a compelling narrative that’s essential reading for anyone interested in the strife-torn world in which this most fascinating queen used both wits and diplomacy to safeguard her kingdom, despite almost insurmountable odds.

- The Pirate Queen, Publisher's Weekly Tweet

Author & Historian

I am a British writer who grew up in the US and lived most of my adult life in Europe, first in France during and following my university years then in the United Kingdom.

History and translating it into commercially viable projects has been my lifeblood for my entire career — be it restoration of historic buildings to alternate use for governments, biographies of historical figures, or writing film scripts about famous people like William Shakespeare, Eleanor of Aquitaine or Tsar Nicholas II. Still, writing non-fiction books has been my primary focus since becoming a full-time writer in 2010.