Today for #HistFicThursdays, I am delighted to once again be teaming up with The Coffee Pot Book Club , this time to share an excerpt from SP Somtow 's fantastic new book Nero and Sporus ! First of all, let's meet the book... Finally available in one volume! The decadence of Imperial Rome comes to life in S.P. Somtow's Literary Titan Award-winning novel about one of ancient history's wildest characters. The historian Suetonius tells us that the Emperor Nero emasculated and married his slave Sporus, the spitting image of murdered Empress Poppaea. But history has more tidbits about Sporus, who went from "puer delicatus" to Empress to one Emperor and concubine to another, and ended up being sentenced to play the Earth-Goddess in the arena. Nero and Sporus is available on #KindleUnlimited via this link . And here's an excerpt to whet your appetite: I suppose we were anxious to see who the surprise competitor would be, but no one was as surprise...
I can’t quite remember what inspired me to watch Our Flag Means Death. I have a vague recollection of watching a trailer on Facebook and then, eventually, picking up my phone and flicking through various streaming platforms, finally settling on that as my pick.
What I was expecting was a farcical pirate romp. Maybe elements of The Muppets’ Treasure Island but with a little more adult content. Lots of hopeless pirates attempting swashbuckling tasks with comically poor results. Possibly a bit of Blackadder-esque historical humour.
As anyone who has watched the series would be able to tell you, I was a little way off the mark. In fact, it is a delicious, hilarious and touching tribute to Wokeness. And I say this as a good thing: all people are welcome here.
For me, watching it straight after finishing (or getting towards the end of, I can’t quite remember) my novel about Alexander the Great, the relationship between Stede and Blackbeard really resonated with me. What begins as a fascination works itself into sexual tension, before it blossoms into a beautiful love story. The Big Misunderstanding at the end is, quite honestly, heartbreaking.
Of course, there are also elements of a more adult version of The Muppets’ Treasure Island, and there are lots – and lots – of hopeless pirates. There is also an antagonist who you want to leap in front of the camera and rip limb from limb.
I would highly recommend this series to anyone looking for a historical programme which has a little bit of everything. As a writer, I can only hope that the relationships I write (whatever they may look like) inspire the same sense of investment from the readers.
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