Rebel Empress Cover Reveal

Rebel Empress Cover Reveal

by | Aug 21, 2024 | Free stuff, Theodosian Women

Book Birthday: August 28, 2024!

It’s hot, hot, hot! I hope you’re keeping hydrated, cool, and reading lots of good books.  If you like biographical historical fiction, I have something special for you. My new book Rebel Empress: A Novel of Imperial Rome is available as an eBook on pre-order at Amazon. It will be out in trade paperback and hardback at all the usual places on August 28. This is the third and final novel in my Theodosian Women series. However, I might squeeze out a couple more novellas based on the daughters of two of my protagonists. We’ll see! If you haven’t read the others in the series Twilight Empress and Dawn Empress, don’t worry. They all take  place in the same time period and can be read in any order as stand-alone novels. I hope you check out the book/series. In the meantime here’s the cover and the blurb:

A beautiful pagan. A ruler searching for a wife. Can a marriage of expedience change the course of an empire?

Constantinople, AD 419. Athenais holds faint hope for her future. When the impoverished orphan’s male relatives offer her up as a consort for the emperor, she reluctantly agrees to study the philosophical arguments for the required conversion to Christianity. But while the accomplished scholar quickly falls for her imperial husband, she struggles with the court’s cutthroat political maneuvering and stubborn religious fanaticism.

Raised to Augusta after birthing her first daughter, Athenais consolidates her influence to build an entourage of skilled artists, writers, and thinkers, despite her jealous sister-in-law’s protests. But just when the protective philosopher thinks she’s won the fight for her spouse’s respect and affection, a series of catastrophes threatens to undermine her hard-earned position.

Can she withstand the storm and claim the throne she so rightly deserves?

Rebel Empress is the insightful third tale in the Theodosian Women biographical historical fiction series. If you like learning about forgotten heroines and immersing yourself in past times, you’ll love Faith L. Justice’s path through tragedies and triumphs.

“A truly remarkable heroine in a truly compelling story.” — Stephanie Cowell, American Book Award Recipient, author of The Boy in the Rain and Claude and Camille: a novel of Monet.

 

While you’re waiting for Rebel Empress to appear, here’s a collection of free historical fiction by some of the best writers in the genre. Any avid HF reader should be able to find something to their taste. While you’re there, check out my collection of HF shorts The Reluctant Groom and Other Historical Stories among these wonderful books. Click on this link (feel free to share) and grab your freebies today,  (closes August 31) : https://books.bookfunnel.com/freehistoricalstories/dibx0s4d5y

Stay cool and enjoy!

Book Review and Giveaway: “Hand of Fire” by Judith Starkston

Book Review and Giveaway: “Hand of Fire” by Judith Starkston

by | Sep 19, 2014 | Books, Fiction, Free stuff, Reviews, Wonderful Women

Book Review and Giveaway:

“Hand of Fire” by Judith Starkston

I get pitched a lot of books. I usually accept about one a month. I like most of them and write a paragraph or two on GoodReads.com, LibraryThing.com or Amazon.com. A very few get the full blog treatment. Hand of Fire by Judith Starkston is one of those I want to enthusiastically share with my fellow readers. Her novel has all the elements I look for in historical fiction: compelling characters, engaging plot, and fascinating setting.

About the book:

Hand of Fire CoverThe Trojan War threatens Troy’s allies and the Greek supply raids spread. A young healing priestess, designated as future queen, must defend her city against both divine anger and invading Greeks. She finds strength in visions of a handsome warrior god; will that be enough when the half-immortal Achilles attacks? Hand of Fire, a tale of resilience and hope, blends history and legend in the untold story of Achilles’s famous captive, Briseis.

My review:

I have a weakness for stories that shine a light on little known women or give silenced women a voice in the way Anita Diamant spoke for the biblical Dina (Joseph’s only sister) in her wildly popular The Red Tent. Starkston takes a similar approach through the story of Briseis. In the Iliad Briseis has only a handful of lines, yet she is a pivotal character in the narrative arc of the classic poem, sparking a rift between Achilles and Agamemnon that almost brings the Greek war against Troy to ruin. In the poem she expresses her love for Achilles in spite of the fact that he killed her brothers and husband, sacked her city, and reduced her status from princess to slave. A tall order to build a believable scenario where that could happen! Starkston does a beautiful job taking the slender clues about Briseis’ life and times and building believable characters. Briseis matures from an uncertain girl to a woman capable of determining her own destiny in this engaging story. (more…)

Halloween Fiction: “Samhain”

Halloween Fiction: “Samhain”

by | Oct 31, 2013 | Fiction, Free stuff, Writing

Reconstruction of Lindow Man

Reconstruction of the “Lindow Man” bog body. Courtesy of Wikipedia.

Samhain

Samhain–the night of the dead. Yevetha knew from the ice around her heart there was one more ghost to walk the night and haunt her dreams. She clutched a tiny fur blanket to her sunken chest and rocked back and forth, keening. Sixteen summers ago she had ripped a bloody baby from the womb of her dying daughter and had wrapped him in the fur.

Yevetha had searched in the bogs for the rare herbs that would bring on her milk and had endured the pain caused to an aging body as it prepared to nurse the tiny infant. Her love had been rewarded as Bohumil grew into a fine strong young man with his mother’s blue eyes.

At the waning of the last full moon, Bohumil had come of an age to marry. He had packed for the hand of days it would take him to travel to the ocean tribes and set out through the forest to trade for a bride price. The full moon returned. Bohumil did not.

Yevetha pulled her worn skin cloak tighter about her shoulders and turned to the fire pit at the back of the hut.  The cramped space reeked of peat smoke and the herbs drying in the thatch ceiling. She pushed at a tangle of coarse gray hair, leaving a smudge of soot across one cheek.

Yevetha had seen forty-six winters. She was weary and there was no one to replace her as healer now that the Sun priests had outlawed the worship of the Great Mother and all Her arts. She spat on the fire. For twenty years the Sun priests had cursed her life. They had converted the village men to their Sun worship and fewer and fewer women met in the secret glade to keep the covenant with the Mother Goddess.

Yevetha pulled a bronze knife from her belt and stretched to cut several herbs from the store in the ceiling. Bitter rue for grief, sweet rosemary for remembrance, and rough hemp for dreams. She took a figure made of twigs from a plain reed basket and tied the tear-stained fur around its waist with a twist of straw. (more…)

Guest Post: Andrei Baltakmens on Early-Modern Crime (and Punishment) in “The Raven’s Seal”

Guest Post: Andrei Baltakmens on Early-Modern Crime (and Punishment) in “The Raven’s Seal”

by | Nov 29, 2012 | Books, Fiction, Free stuff, Guest Post, History

Guest Post: Early-Modern Crime (and Punishment) in “The Raven’s Seal”

I’m back from New Zealand and–totally by coincidence–I’m hosting a New Zealand author. As readers of this blog know, I’m a Dickens fan. I can’t get enough of his quirky characters, dark settings, twisty plots and–yes!–even his social preaching. One of my favorites, Little Dorritt (reviewed here) features a debtor’s prison which is just as much a character as its human inhabitants. That’s why I was so pleased to score a copy of The Raven’s Seal a historical mystery written in the style of Dickens. The author Andrei Baltakmens is a Dickens scholar and plants an eighteenth-century prison in the heart of his novel. The gaol (jail for us in the US) broods over the prose and lurks in the background infusing the story with its dark presence. From the first paragraph:

“The Old Bellstrom Gaol crouched above the fine city of Airenchester like a black spider on a heap of spoils. It presided over The Steps, a ramshackle pile of cramped yards and tenements teeming about rambling stairs, and glared across the River Pentlow towards Battens Hill, where the sombre courts and city halls stood. From Cracksheart Hill, the Bellstrom loomed on every prospect and was glimpsed at the end of every lane.”

Many thanks to Andrei for providing a guest post on eighteenth-century crime and punishment and to his publisher Top Five Books for providing a giveaway copy (details at the end of the post.) (more…)

Guest Post: Enid Shomer on “The Twelve Rooms of the Nile”

Guest Post: Enid Shomer on “The Twelve Rooms of the Nile”

by | Oct 17, 2012 | Books, Fiction, Free stuff, Guest Post, Wonderful Women

Guest Post: Enid Shomer on “The Twelve Rooms of the Nile”

The Twelve Rooms of the Nile CoverI just finished The Twelve Rooms of the Nile, a novel about the imagined meeting of Florence Nightingale and Gustave Flaubert when they both traveled the fabled river–before they became famous. It’s a lovely literary effort with wonderful insights into two intriguing characters. I’m pleased to host a guest post by the author Enid Shomer where she tells us how she came to know both these remarkable people and write about them. Ms. Shomer’s short fiction and poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic and The Paris Review among other publications. This is her first novel. Thanks to her publisher Simon and Schuster for providing two copies of this book for a giveaway (details at the end of the post.) If you want to learn more about Ms. Shomer and her writing, please visit her website. Enjoy! (more…)

Book Review: “The Seven Wonders” by Steven Saylor

Book Review: “The Seven Wonders” by Steven Saylor

by | Jul 7, 2012 | Books, Fiction, Free stuff, Reviews

 

“The Seven Wonders” by Steven Saylor

Seven Wonders coverGordianus the Finder is back in this prequel to Steven Saylor’s popular series of mysteries set in the Roman Republic of Cicero and Caesar. Gordianus is eighteen and embarks on the First Century BCE equivalent of a “Grand Tour” with his old tutor and famous poet Antipater of Sidon. As the Italian peninsula simmers with rebellion, the pair head east to visit the Seven Wonders of the World encountering murder, mysteries and political intrigues. Over the course of their year-plus journey, Gordianus evolves into “the Finder” series readers have come to know and love.

For the record, I am not a Gordianus fan. I very much enjoyed Saylor’s multi-generational epics Roma and Empire, which I reviewed, but didn’t take to the couple of Finder novels I sampled. Not because they were bad books, but because I’m not that into historical mysteries. Every reader has her quirks. This book has a distinctly different structure from the others. Saylor uses the journey to visit the Seven Wonders as a framework for several short stories (many of which were previously published in mystery and fantasy magazines.) Each Wonder gets a story with a few interludes, such as attending the Olympic Games and visiting the ruins of Corinth, resulting in ten chapters dealing with murder, witchcraft, ghosts and gods. As their journey continues, a larger mystery entangles Gordianus and Antipater with spies and other enemies of Rome. (more…)