Woman in power? Better watch your step.

As I watch the Democratic presidential campaign and realize with increasing dismay that it appears America will not get to cast its votes for or against the first female nominee, I’ve been thinking of how we as a culture, and history by and large, has engaged in a subtle, and, at times, not so subtle character assassination of women in power. Already, media giants proclaim Hillary is damaging the Democratic Party’s unity and should concede defeat; headlines scream she’s “Toast!” and focus on the fact that her male counterparts are beginning to show their testosterone-driven competitiveness and leaving her behind in the dust. Her tenacity to remain focused on the prize and her right to campaign until the Party announces its official nominee is seen as divisive and obstinate; she is the proverbial apple of discord.

In other words, girlfriend is not playing by the rules.

None of this is new, of course. What is it about a powerful woman that freaks us out? History is riddled with tales of ladies who’ve shaped and defied society by asserting their power, and of the men who did everything they could to destroy these women’s credibility – and, in some memorable occasions, their very lives. Such women are deemed rapacious examples of their sex, all for acting pretty much the same as any man in their position would.

Take Cleopatra, for example. She ruled Egypt. By herself. She did away with her enemies and forged alliances with powerful neighbors to protect her kingdom. Then she was crushed by the Romans and allegedly killed herself. Her deeds are heroic; yet her strength, intelligence, and superior capacity (she certainly showed more level-headedness than most of the men around her) have been eroded throughout the ages by posthumous depictions of her as that slinky vamp who used sex as a weapon. Ergo, she was a slut and got what she deserved, never mind that she had more humanity and culture in her little finger than Octavian displayed in his entire imperial career.

Then, there’s Juana la Loca, the subject of my upcoming novel THE LAST QUEEN. She inherited the throne of Castile from her mother Queen Isabella, who was a monarch in her own right, with more power and prestige than her consort, King Ferdinand. Juana, however, was married at the time to Philip of Habsburg and he wanted the throne all to himself. So, he engaged in a hostile takeover and very public, media-driven character assassination of his wife’s ability to rule– and all because she showed mettle and told him to get himself his own kingdom and stay the #*!! away from hers. To this day, Juana has been called la Loca, the mad one. She’s the proverbial histrionic wife because when a woman fights back with everything she’s got, well, she must be crazy, right? Never mind that her husband should never have messed with her business to start with; never mind that successive male generations of her descendants did their utmost to pretend she didn’t exist because they’d stolen her crown— historians still promulgate the posthumous diagnosis that she must have been off her meds.

And we have history’s poster girl for bad behavior: Anne Boleyn. She told an egomaniac of a king, “No, I won’t sleep with you until I get the ring, the castle, and my kids aren't bastards” – the requirements of any well bred princess. She then pushed this king to examine his laws and figure out why he needed to obey a pope when the answer to his dilemma (he was unfortunately married at the time) was within his grasp. In other words, get a good divorce lawyer if you want me. What happens? She gets accused of screwing around on him and they cut off her head. And then she proceeds to accumulate five hundred years of bad press. She’s the home wrecking witch, never mind that she changed the course of English history and showed more acumen, fierce determination, and sheer nerve than Henry himself.

Surely, these women deserve better. While men earn the equivalent of historical gold stars for swaggering about proclaiming their worthiness, consolidating their assets and engaging in occasional acts of rapine, women still labor under the male-propagated ideal that their place is in the home and at the hearth. Cleopatra, Juana and Anne were all good mothers by all accounts; and they kept a spiffy palace, I’ll bet. They also knew how to wield their brains.

At least I know Hillary Clinton is in good company.

Interview with Susan Higginbotham, author of THE TRAITOR'S WIFE

I'm honored to welcome Susan Higginbotham, author of widely popular THE TRAITOR'S WIFE. Susan and I have been corresponding for a while now; she has interviewed me in the past and is an active member of the Historical Novel Society. Her first novel is set in fourteenth-century England, where young Eleanor de Clare, a favored niece of King Edward II, finds herself married to the notorious Hugh le Despenser, who eventually becomes the king's lover. Eleanor's own appointment to Queen Isabella’s household as a lady-in-waiting plunges her into the private feuds, intrigues, and tragic schemes that surround the king and her husband. While Edward II's story may be familiar to many readers, Eleanor's is not - and her voice is a refeshing, candid, and witty addition to the canon about this most unfortunate of medieval English monarchs.

1. Congratulations on the ongoing success of THE TRAITOR'S WIFE. It's a delight to have you with us. Set in 14th century England during the controversial reign of Edward II, THE TRAITOR'S WIFE is a dramatic and often witty account of Eleanor de Clare and her marriage to the king's intimate, Hugh le Despenser. While this era is not as well covered in fiction as, say, Tudor times, Edward II has an avid following a la Richard III, and your novel offers an interesting take on his life as seen through the eyes of a fiercely loyal woman caught, often literally, in the middle. You also have stated you hold a great interest in the War of the Roses. What inspires you about medieval England and why did you write about these particular characters?

One thing that constantly amazes and inspires me about the medieval period is how resilient people had to be. Modern women have devoted endless time and resources to complaining about things such as juggling work and family, but a medieval woman had to cope routinely with deaths of close family members, warfare, and struggles over property--and those were the women in the most privileged classes. It certainly makes some of our modern-day preoccupations look quite trivial.

I became interested in Edward II’s reign when one day while surfing the Internet, I came across an online version of Christopher Marlowe’s play Edward the Second. I’d read it years before in graduate school, but upon this re-reading, I became fascinated by the historical background to it and began reading everything about Edward II I could get my hands on. Along the way, I learned of Eleanor de Clare and her extraordinary life. One of the earliest things I learned about her was that her second husband had been one of her first husband’s captors. I wondered what had made her decide to marry him--or whether she had been forced into it--and as I continued my research into her life, I knew that she had a story that begged to be told.

2. THE TRAITOR'S WIFE offers some surprising moments, including a frank look at Edward II's homosexuality and Eleanor de Clare's devotion to a man who loves her and also loves the king. What challenges did you encounter while researching this book? What surprising or interesting facts did you discover about your characters and their roles in history?

I was very lucky in that as I was researching my novel, several nonfiction books appeared that dealt with various aspects of Edward II’s reign. That helped immensely, as did my access to well-stocked university libraries that offered inexpensive borrowing privileges to the public. I was still left, though, with the problem that very little had been written about Hugh le Despenser the younger and that still even less had been written about Eleanor de Clare. I dug through everything I could find in the English language about Edward II and his reign, looking for any reference to Eleanor, no matter how tiny. Sometimes I got lucky--it was a great day when I found a couple of letters by her. They were purely business letters, and they were probably dictated to a clerk rather than written by Eleanor herself, but they gave me at least a small sense of her voice.

One of the more intriguing items I learned as I did my research was that several scholars have suggested, based on some oblique references by some chroniclers and some entries in the king’s household records, that Eleanor might have been the mistress of Edward II, her own uncle! That speculation did find its way into my story.

3. An interesting storyline within the novel is Eleanor's compassionate relationship with Edward and her awareness of Edward's queen's growing resentment. Isabel de Valois has been dubbed the "She-Wolf of France" for her eventual role in Edward's demise; she's often seen as a conniving, thwarted woman who committed regicide. Many seem to forget how young she was when she first wed Edward or how ill equipped a princess in those times was to contend with an openly gay husband. Is there evidence to support Clare's relationship with the queen? Why do you think Isabel is usually portrayed unsympathetically?

Household records show that Eleanor was a lady-in-waiting to Isabella early on in Edward II’s reign, long before her husband gained any influence over Edward II. Presumably Eleanor got the position because of her close kinship with Edward; it seems likely that they were friendly in those early years. That changed, of course, after Despenser began to gain influence and power.

Some historians and novelists, and feminist ones in particular, have attributed Isabella’s unfavorable portrayal to the bias of male chroniclers and to a double standard for women who commit adultery, but I think Isabella’s own actions are largely responsible for the unsympathetic view of her. When she and Mortimer overthrew Edward II, he and the Despenser family were enormously unpopular, with good reason. Had Isabella and Mortimer settled for giving themselves some reasonable rewards and allowing Edward III’s council to govern during his minority, our judgment of them might be very different--they might well be regarded as heroes or liberators, and even Edward II’s demise might have chalked up to unfortunate necessity, as Richard II’s and Henry VI’s often are. Instead, the queen and Mortimer alienated their supporters, and ultimately the young Edward III himself, by showering themselves with grants and by shutting other members of the nobility out of power. They had the advantage of the Despensers’ mistakes to learn from, yet they repeated them--in Isabella’s case, even to the point of furthering Mortimer’s interests at the expense of those of her son the king.

5. The wit in the novel often helps to relieve moments of great intensity, a refreshing additive we don't often find in historical novels. Eleanor also has a very eventful life, including marrying the man who was responsible for capturing her first husband, Hugh. Then she's accused of marrying two different men at the same time. You mention in the afterword that your interpretation of this event is fictional, though historical records indicate that her marriage to Zouche was challenged. When working with such complex events of the past, which often lack definitive explanation, how do you go about making decisions as to how you'll depict them? Why did you think this particular event was important to Eleanor's story?

With the marriage dispute, we know that the case went before the papal courts several times and that judgment was given on one occasion in favor of one man, on another to the other man. So whatever the facts were--and it’s a fond hope of mine that there’s a relevant document in some long-forgotten Vatican file that might be unearthed someday--they evidently were very much open to dispute. So knowing the relevant laws on marriage at the time, I had to create a set of facts that could plausibly give rise to such a dispute, facts that at the same time could be argued either way by a medieval lawyer. I used the same approach with other unexplained events, trying to create a plausible scenario in light of what I knew about the parties involved.

I thought the marriage dispute was important to Eleanor’s story because as I saw it, her ability to form a loving relationship with William la Zouche after her first marriage ended so traumatically was part of her resilience--a quality that the historical Eleanor must have possessed in abundance and the one that drew me to telling her story. At the same time, her entanglement with Grey was part of another aspect of her character--her impulsiveness or recklessness, which historically is suggested by the episode with the royal jewels.

6. Can you tell us about methods you employ to give your characters authenticity?

One of the best pieces of advice I ever had as a writer was by a law school professor of mine who taught our trial advocacy course. When we were doing mock criminal trials and were assigned our defendants, he said, “Each of these people has a sympathetic side to them. It’s your job to show the jury that.” I think that applies to writing as well, the need to look at what motivates people, to show them as complex, multifaceted people instead of just being “good” or “bad” characters. I don’t think this has answered your question very well, though! Really, it’s difficult to articulate a specific method--I just try to be fair to my characters, to see their actions from differing points of view, and to make them creatures of their own time and place, not ours.

7. How do you think your novel speaks to today’s reader or how do the events you evoke resonate for today’s world?

I think modern-day readers can sympathize much more readily with Edward II, and even with Isabella, than their contemporaries could. We can see Edward as a decent man caught in the wrong job and Isabella as a passionate woman caught up in what must have been a frustrating marriage, at least in its last years. My intent in writing this novel, though, was never to explore parallels with today’s world. My interest was in illuminating the life of a courageous woman whose resiliency I came greatly to admire, and I think stories like hers have an enduring appeal. Hers is a quiet sort of heroism, but it’s heroism nonetheless.

8. Please tell us about your next project.

I’m about a quarter into a novel set during the Wars of the Roses that features Harry Stafford, the second Duke of Buckingham, who’s notorious for helping Richard III gain the throne and then for abruptly turning against him. It also features Harry’s wife, Katherine, who was a younger sister of Elizabeth Woodville, Edward IV’s much-maligned queen. Though many have speculated, no one knows what made Harry act as he did or what if any role he played in the disappearance of the Princes in the Tower--and my challenge has been to create an explanation for his actions that’s consistent with the known facts and that is psychologically plausible. In doing so, I’ve come to like Harry and his wife a great deal, and I hope the reader will as well.

Thank you, Susan! We're looking forward to your next novel. Susan is also the author of Hugh and Bess: A Love Story, featuring characters who appear in The Traitor's Wife.

First official review

I got some good news. My first official review for THE LAST QUEEN appeared in Publishers Weekly and everyone at Ballantine Books is thrilled. The galleys went out only recently, so I was surprised to hear a review had already appeared. I was also taken aback by its generosity.

My agent had gotten word shortly before she left the London Book Fair that the review would be published - which would prove a boost to her in promoting the sale of foreign rights, if the review was good. But she didn't tell me the review was due, because she knew I'd work myself into a froth over the possible implications of it being negative. She knows me well :) I've been warned by fellow writers far more established than me that these reviews can "make or break" a new writer's career. That in of itself seems rather unfair: I mean, is not reading subjective? How can a mere review determine the fate of any writer?

Well, apparently, it can - and often does. More and more, overworked booksellers and librarians are looking at the reviews from the four big sources - Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, Booklist and Library Journal -to decide which books to purchase for their customers and patrons. The marketplace is crowded; space in physical outlets is shrinking; independent stores are struggling. No bookstore or even library, except perhaps the Library of Congress, can stock every book published. Reviews assist buyers to make decisions regarding their merchandise.

It's hard for me, both as a reader and a writer, to regard books as "merchandise", though in fact that is exactly what they are in the commercial setting. To me, the copy I buy is unique, imbued with the magic of words meant for me alone. I tend to forget at least another 5,000 copies sit elsewhere, waiting for other besotted readers to make them their own. I suppose it's just as well that I can persist to some extent in my own naivete: I do have a marketing background that will help me immeasurably to hit the ground running, so to speak, when my book is released; yet to retain some of that wonder I've always had when I see a book will also help buoy me past the crueler shoals of the big bad world of large scale publishing and sales.

Anyway, so I got congratulatory e-mails and a good PW review. It should have been *starred", my associates lament. Honestly, I'm just happy that I've glided gracefully past this particular shoal, seeing as it could have sunk my ship.

If you want to read the review, here it is:
The Last Queen C.W. Gortner. Ballantine, $25 (384p) ISBN 978-0-345-50184-4
The 1492 conquest of Granada makes for high adventure and royal intrigue in this second sparkling historical from Gortner (The Secret Lion). Spanish Princess Juana, 13, watches as her parents, King Fernando and Queen Isabel, unite Spain, vanquish Moors and marry their children off to foreign kingdoms for favorable alliances: Princess Catalina becomes first wife to Henry VIII; Princess Juana, who narrates, is shipped off to marry Philip of Flanders, heir to the Hapsburg Empire. Although Juana balks at leaving Spain for the north and a husband she has never met, their instant chemistry soon turns to love. Years and children later, Juana unexpectedly becomes next in line to the Spanish crown and must carefully navigate every step of the journey from Flanders to Spain, fearful of alienating husband or parents or both. Emotional and political tensions soar as Juana’s loyalties are tested to their limits. Disturbing royal secrets and court manipulations wickedly twist this enthralling story, brilliantly told. (July)

Interview with Judith Merkle Riley, author of THE SERPENT GARDEN

I'm honored to present Judith Merkle Riley, acclaimed author of THE SERPENT GARDEN, A VISION OF LIGHT, IN PURSUIT OF THE GREEN LION and THE WATER DEVIL (all re-issued recently by Three Rivers Press), as well as the sublime MASTER OF ALL DESIRES and THE ORACLE GLASS (soon to be reissued).

I had the tremendous good fortune to meet Judith in 2004 at the first U.S. Historical Novel Society Conference. I'd been a fan for years, and I was delighted to discover that she's as witty, observant, and intelligent as her books are. We struck up a friendship at the conference that has since flourished. She is responsible in no small measure for encouraging me to submit my work to my current agent, who ended up representing me and selling my books.

Judith writes about the medieval and renaissance periods; her lead characters are fictional women: ambitious, smart women chaffing against societal restrictions as they pursue with singular determination their heart's desires. While her characters often interact with historical events and people, what distinguishes Judith's work beyond its sparkling prose is her keen insight into the hearts of her characters and the patina of the supernatural that expertly interlaces with everyday life. No one is perfect in her worlds; and as in real life, the absurd often underscores the tragic. I rarely laugh out loud when I read a historical novel; with Judith's novels, I always do. She is a dame of the genre in every sense of the word; no one writes quite like her and her books are both delights and inspirations.

1. Judith, it's an honor to have you with us. Congratulations on the re-releases of your Margaret of Ashbury trilogy (A VISION OF LIGHT, IN PURSUIT OF THE GREEN LION and THE WATER DEVIL) and THE SERPENT GARDEN. It must be wonderful to see your work reach a whole new audience. Your novels are unique, in that you combine a scholar's historical insight and attention to detail with great wit and a dash of the supernatural. What inspired you to write historical fiction?
I LOVE historical fiction; I grew up on that and on Sci-Fi. I just didn't think I could write. In fact, as a kid, I thought fiction was some sort of eternal thought that came from another place not of this earth, and didn't "get" that actual people wrote it. I guess I still think that, even though I discovered I could write fiction myself. It all started when I wrote an academic non-fiction book, and my colleagues said it was suspect as social science because it was "too well written." Well, thought I (after much debate) if I write too well for my profession, why not try a better one? If the novel's awful, I can always hide it, and the colleagues will never know!

2. Your novels feature strong female characters who face, and often subvert or overcome, obstacles of gender and social circumstance. Margaret of Ashbury wants to write but is illiterate; Susanna, the heroine of THE SERPENT GARDEN, becomes a painter in a time when women rarely had careers. As a writer, how do you go about conceiving your lead characters? Do you find portraying their experiences as women of the past easy or challenging? Can you tell us about any methods you used to make your characters realistic and yet still accessible to the modern reader?
My lead characters are usually composites of women who actually did the things I write about. For example, writing a novel about people in the medieval period is greatly hampered by the fact that few wrote about their state of consciousness -- and who wrote about women anyway? The exception is the mystics -- and the women mystics who wrote (and usually had to dictate their writing to a priest) would generally begin:"I know I am only a woman, and should not write, but GOD told me to." So there is Margaret of Ashbury, and Margaret's God, as well. Who could resist? Susanna (of THE SERPENT GARDEN) is also a composite: she began when I discovered that Victorian-era historians had misread "paintrix" in the royal accounts for "nutrix" (nurse) because they couldn't imagine that a woman could be a painter! It's quite a feat of sexism to translate a painter into a wet nurse.

It is actually quite a challenge to portray a woman of the period and make clear the difficulties she faced without giving her a modern consciousness. In A Vision of Light, I used a framing narrative, and now I would find it very difficult to give up the first person, third person narrative. It lets one explore the social structure while keeping the "I" uncontaminated. There is also the question of portraying their relationship to their work in a realistic fashion. I once read a horrible novel about troubadours where all they did was tune their lutes in between bedroom scenes. It was pretty clear the novelist knew nothing about lutes, let alone music or musicians. We have a duty to try to put the reader into the 3-D alternative world seen by the characters. That's where the fun is, both for writer and reader.

3. Your novels take place in medieval and Tudor England, and later Renaissance France. Real historical figures often interact with your fictional leads. Do you feel responsibility to adhere to facts when recreating historical figures within a fictional framework?
I spend a lot of time with primary sources to try to keep the "real" historical characters as close as I can to what they did, saw, and felt. I don't rearrange dates or shift what is known about someone's personality into something more suitable for my purpose. (That is so '50's! I remember a book where the "She-Wolf of France" got a personality transplant and became a medieval Stepford Wife.) The problem comes when records are controversial, contradictory, or missing altogether. Sometimes you get surprises, too, when you start digging away, and someone is not at all what you have been led to believe. That makes it fun to write a "new" picture.

4. The supernatural forms a very real part of your fictional worlds, whether it's
alchemy in Margaret of Ashbury's England, witchcraft in THE ORACLE GLASS or devils in THE SERPENT GARDEN. Did people of these times believe in the supernatural as a real force upon their daily lives? What fascinating facts have you discovered about supernatural beliefs in your research?
As for the supernatural, it was so much a part of thinking back then, it would be unreal to leave it out. We forget that medieval people were Catholics, many went to mass every day, and they expected miracles. They also believed the Devil could pop up any time, and had probably offered one's suspiciously prosperous neighbor a slightly sulphurous contract. As for the witches in The Oracle Glass, we have the complete records of their interrogation under torture. They believed in a lot of what they did, and to the degree it was flim-flam, their clients certainly believed they had diabolical "powers." The age of enlightenment had barely gained a toehold in those days, and the wells of superstition were deep. The thing I wouldn't do, however, is stray from period beliefs -- say, putting space aliens into the 15th century. That's for another kind of fiction.

5. Historical fiction has become immensely popular of late, something we all can celebrate. Your novels defy genre conventions: they are historically accurate yet fictional in approach; they are based often on events that happened yet are transposed to suit the needs of your characters. As a novelist, you do a formidable job of combining these elements into exciting and often humorous accounts that shed more light on the realities of life in the past than many, more "serious" historical novels. Did you set out to create a novel that defied genre expectations, and if so, did you encounter difficulties during the process of submitting to publishers?
Yes to historical fiction! I never thought I was crossing genres. I just wrote what I liked to read. Luckily, I have a wonderful agent who understood what I was about and knew exactly how to sell my books. She sheltered me from difficulties and made everything work so that I could concentrate on writing.

6. How do you think your novel speaks to today's reader, or how do the events you evoke resonate in today's world?
I don't think I can write without portraying things that resonate with today's reader. Greed, the financing of wars, the bankruptcy of nations, desperate social climbing, the collapse of morals, and the struggle to survive are universal themes. But instead of writing "The French were bankrupting their state with bad accounting and tax policies and headed toward a violent revolution," I have greedy witches mocking commercial values, idiot money-hungry aristocrats, the rioting poor, and people who see clearly but differ on what to do about it. Everybody is keeping on keeping on, and hoping the whole problem will go away. Why wouldn't it resonate?

7. Please tell us about your next project.
Currently I have taken on something a little different. I am using a wonderful real-life character , and it is a challenge to keep her accurate, explain her back story without being tiresome, and keep the information about her later life from tainting the period about which I am writing. Composites are easier!

Thank you, Judith. It's been a pleasure and we're looking forward to your next book. In the meantime, readers can find the handsome new trade editions of her reissued novels whereever books are sold.

A little blatant self promotion

Okay, a little blatant self-promotion:
My cover art for Ballantine Books (US) of THE LAST QUEEN has arrived. I must say, I love it. I think it evokes Juana of Castile's mystery perfectly. I also have my UK cover art - well, actually a draft of it, on the left. I'm told it will undergo some PhotoShop magic, but the image is there. The contrast between the publisher approaches is fascinating: for different reasons, I like both. THE LAST QUEEN will be released on July 29, 2008 in the US and in October (tentative date) in the UK. I don't have Spanish, Italian or German cover art yet, but when I do, I'll post it. Hope you enjoy!

A Pharaoh Reborn

It's not easy to take on a well-known historical figure. Some are so familiar to readers - and often so over-written - it would seem there's nothing new anyone can say about them. In some cases, new books about such figures rely on subtle - and not so subtle! - shifts in the telling or reinterpret events through another's eyes, the "witness to history" point of view. In others, such as Karen Essex's KLEOPATRA and PHARAOH, new life is breathed into the story itself.

I've been a fan of Ms Essex's since I reviewed her third novel LEONARDO'S SWANS for the Historical Novel Society, yet when I came across used copies of her debut as a fiction writer, a two-volume set about arguably Egypt's most famous queen, I must admit I hesitated. I love historical fiction set in ancient Egypt; but I've read several novels on Cleopatra (including Margaret George's epic) and wasn't sure I cared to read another. I mean, how much more is there to know? The headdress, the grandeur, the asp: she's practically a cliche.

Fortunately, my ignorance didn't prevail over my insatiable curiosity and need to own every historical novel ever published. I bought both volumes in Ms Essex's series - KLEOPATRA and PHARAOH -and started the first one in the evening after dinner. By midnight, I had to tear myself away to brush my teeth and go to bed. And still, despite the fact that I had to work in the morning, I read for another half-hour. I finished the first volume in a week and couldn't sink my teeth into the second one fast enough. I carried these books with me everywhere. I missed a bus stop. I stole time at work to read. I didn't finish my website. I was obsessed.

Ms Essex is a marvelous writer by any standard. Her prose is luminous and precise; she structures her sentences with consummate style and her wit fits her subject matter perfectly. There were lines in these books I read over and over, simply for their beauty, such as the opening line to KLEOPATRA: "There is something about the air in Alexandria. It is said the sea-god Poseidon, who lived near the Isle of Pharos, blew a divine whisper over the town." Now, when a book starts like that, I'm all yours.

KLEOPATRA (spelled the way she herself did, according to her Greek origins) tells the story of Kleopatra's childhood to the time she inherits her throne. Her relationship with her eccentric father, Ptolemy XII Auletes, and her ruthless siblings; her fascination with Rome and keen awareness of her blood ties to Alexander the Great and to Egypt, as well as her awakening to the dangers and euphorias of power are gorgeously rendered. Even more importantly, this is a Kleopatra we haven't met. Not the adventuress, the siren, the scheming manipulative seductress - roles she's been forced into by later historians; roles so often allotted to women in history and, to this day, still perpetuated by even our allegedly enlightened society. No, here she is keenly observant, cunning, vital, bold, curious and handsome - but not beautiful: an intelligent, often narcissistic princess who learns the price she must pay for survival. The brutality of court life is not glossed over or exaggerated; it's simply there, a fact, sometimes swift and shockingly cruel. The pleasures of court life are depicted with heady aromatic sensousness and an erudite knowledge of the pagan glories that fueled the ancient world; as Kleopatra matures into the extraordinary woman she will become, we mature with her.

In PHARAOH, the story becomes more familiar as Kleopatra forges her alliances with Julius Caesar and Marc Antony, and grows all too intimate with the chaotic savagery and hypocritical refinements of Rome. Yet again, the unexpected reigns: Caesar is world-weary and set apart by his divine attributes, even as he recognizes Rome's unworthiness. Marc Antony, on the other hand, is an eager Herculean boy - pummeling his way through life with a meaty grin and ultimately fragile self-worth. As she binds herself, and the future of Egypt, to these very different men, Kleopatra herself evolves into an astute ruler whose one terrifying caveat is her dependence on the very civilization that seeks her downfall. Her myth, her courage, her lust, her mistakes: these are all here, too, portrayed with sensibility and an astonishing lack of sentimentality.

In this era, when the history is so often downplayed, oversimplified, distorted or romanticized to suit the fiction, these novels are, in my opinion, sublime examples of what a writer dedicated to authenticity can achieve, even with a character as maligned and exploited as Egypt's last pharoah. Ms Essex's new novel STEALING ATHENA will be released June 17. I can't wait.

Another exciting giveaway at LoadedQuestions.com

My friend Kelly Hewitt has announced another exciting giveaway at LoadedQuestions.com. Read an interview with Catherine Delors, debut author of the highly anticipated MISTRESS OF THE REVOLUTION, and sign up to win one of five free copies. Follow this link and good luck! http://loadedquestions.blogspot.com/2008/03/loaded-questions-free-giveway-mistress.html