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Black Ships » (Reprint)

Book cover image of Black Ships by Jo Graham

Authors: Jo Graham
ISBN-13: 9780316067997, ISBN-10: 0316067997
Format: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Orbit
Date Published: December 2009
Edition: Reprint

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Author Biography: Jo Graham

Jo Graham lives in Maryland with her family, and has worked in politics for many years.

Book Synopsis

In a time of war and doubt, Gull is an oracle. Daughter of a slave taken from fallen Troy, chosen at the age of seven to be the voice of the Lady of the Dead, she is destined to counsel kings.

When nine black ships appear, captained by an exiled Trojan prince, Gull must decide between the life she was born for and a most perilous adventure - to join the remnant of her mother's people in their desperate flight. From the doomed bastions of the City of Pirates to the temples of Byblos, from the intrigues of the Egyptian court to the haunted caves beneath Mount Vesuvius, only Gull can guide Prince Aeneas on his quest, and only she can dare the gate of the Underworld to lead him to his destiny.

In the last shadowed days of the Age of Bronze, one woman dreams of the world beginning anew. This is her story.

Just as Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon breathed new life into Arthurian legend, BLACK SHIPSevokes the world of ancient Greece with beautiful, haunting prose, extraordinary imagination, and a profoundly moving story.

Publishers Weekly

Graham's exquisite and bleak debut views the events of The Aeneidthrough the oracle Gull, a disciple of the Lady of the Dead. Taken to the Lady's temple after being lamed in a chariot accident, Gull quickly displays her power to see the future. Her first vision-black ships fleeing a burning city-lets her recognize Aeneas when he arrives after the fall of Wilusa (the Hittite name for Troy), hoping to save those sold into slavery. Gull joins Aeneas, and they take the few remaining people of Wilusa on a glorious journey to find their scattered brethren and a site where they can found a new city. Historians will admire Graham's deft blending of Virgil's epic story and historical fact, most notably the creation of Egyptian princess Basetamon to take the place of magnificently anachronistic Dido. Graham's spare style focuses on action, but fraught meaning and smoldering emotional resonance overlay her deceptively simple words. (Mar.)

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