Honoré de Balzac has contributed to The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan as an author. He is generally regarded as a founding father of realism in European fiction. His large output of works, collectively entitled The Human Comedy (La Comidie Humaine), consists of 95 finished works (stories, novels and essays) and 48 unfinished works. His stories are an attempt to comprehend and depict the realities of life in contemporary bourgeois France. They are placed in a variety of settings, with characters reappearing in multiple stories.

这部小说讲述了人到中年的德卡迪央王妃在社会变革导致其地位没落的背景下，施展自身魅力，让一位作家拜倒在自己石榴裙下的故事。然而，这不仅仅是一个简单的爱情故事，还融入了德卡迪央王妃和德埃斯巴侯爵夫人两位女性之间亦敌亦友的微妙情谊、德卡迪央王妃对爱情既渴望又不愿投入的复杂心态，以及王妃诱德阿泰兹一步步陷入自己圈套的巧妙手段。德卡迪央王妃的秘密是她从来没有爱过自己的那些爱慕者，这个秘密或许会让德阿泰兹大为吃惊。而德阿泰兹"芸芸众生之中，为什么就不应该有一个女人玩弄男人，就像男人玩弄女人那样？"的发问也许更能引起读者的深思和震惊。