God's Concubine (The Troy Game Series, Book Two) FROM THE PUBLISHER
From Ancient Greece they came, remnants of the glorious Trojans. Led by Brutus, Kingman, holder of the bands of gold that wield the very magic of the gods, these travelers are bowed but not broken, and they have come to Albion to begin anew. A vision of beauty called them to create a new Troy, and when they arrived on the shores of the land that became Britain, they found an old magic that was fading. And so they began to construct a new Labryinth, a place of magic that will bring unimaginable power to those who can control it.
The temptress who brought Brutus to this land seeks to use him for her own purposes, but in that she fails, for it is the bride of Brutus who dooms the completion of the Labyrinth...and sends all the players in this drama - handsome Brutus, his beautiful wife, Cornelia, and the sensuous and deadly Genvissa - into a hell of death and rebirth, until the Labyrinth is completed and the ancient magic is set free.
A thousand years pass. Cathedrals rise in place of mud and wattle huts, hymns to saints replace odes to Celtic and Greek gods. But the magic from the dawn of time waits, and the players are not yet done with their destinies. They have new faces and new bodies, but old souls - and not all who have come back remember their parts in this drama. There are kings and princes, deadly court intrigues, and ancient powers awoken.
And a warrior across the sea who only waits for his opportunity to finish what was started centuries before.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
In the long, complex second installment of her Troy Game quartet (after 2003's Hades' Daughter), Australian author Douglass moves her teeming cast of mythic heroes from ancient Greece to 11th-century England (aka Albion). The labyrinth that Brutus, the leader of fallen Troy, established 1,000 years before has evolved into London. Harold Godwineson and William the Conqueror are engaged in a vicious power struggle that will decide not only who will rule Britain but also who will control the labyrinthine Game that underpins this ambitious fantasy series. Since the principal characters, good guys and villains alike, are regularly reborn, death is a mere inconvenience. Whether or not they remember their earlier lives, they behave just as they did in past incarnations. This inability to alter or grow lends a certain flatness to the characters, despite the space Douglass devotes to their emotional histories and motivations. Still, the admirable Caela, Harold's sister, makes a beguiling heroine and her visions of London in 1939, on the eve of WWII, provide some tantalizing glimpses of what's in store in the projected fourth and final Troy Game volume. (Mar. 1) Forecast: Sara Douglass is the pseudonym of Sara Warneke, an academic historian. Advertising in Glamour and Allure magazines will help reach the young female target audience. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
As Edward, King of England, enters into a loveless marriage with Eadwyth, daughter of the earl of Wessex, William, the Duke of Normandy, makes his own plans that eventually result in the conquest of Britain. William, however, remembers an earlier life when he, as Brutus, once wielded the magic of the ancient gods of Troy and seeks again to construct a magical labyrinth to bring back the power of the ancient world. The sequel to Hades' Daughter advances the time period by 1000 years but reiterates the major themes of its predecessor: the conflict between law and chaos, life and death, and good and evil. Douglass excels in panoramic storytelling, combining faithful period detail with compelling characters. A good choice for most fantasy collections. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Home
