The Virtual Book Tour for EROMENOS by Melanie McDonald starts today! Please join Melanie as she travels the blogosphere from July 18th - September 26th.
Eromenos Virtual Book Tour Schedule
Monday, July 18th
Author Guest Post at C.W. Gortner's Historical Boys
Thursday, July 21st
Review at Bibliophilic Book Blog
Monday, July 25th
Author Guest Post at Christy English's A Writer's Life: Working with the Muse
Review at Unabridged Chick
Friday, July 29th
Review at A Writer's Life: Working with the Muse
Monday, August 1st
Author Interview at Unabridged Chick
Thursday, August 4th
Review at Bibrary Bookslut
Monday, August 8th
Review at Debbie's Book Bag
Thursday, August 11th
Review at Bonjour, Cass
Monday, August 15th
Review at The Musings of a Book Junkie
Thursday, August 18th
Review at Bippity Boppity Book
Author Guest Post at The Musings of a Book Junkie
Monday, August 22nd
Review at Let Them Read Books
Thursday, August 25th
Review at Broken Teepee
Monday, August 29th
Review at The Book Garden
Thursday, September 1st
Author Guest Post at One Book Shy of a Full Shelf
Monday, September 5th
Author Guest Post at The True Book Addict
Review at One Book Shy of a Full Shelf
Thursday, September 8th
Review at The True Book Addict
Thursday, September 15th
Review at A Bookish Affair
Monday, September 19th
Review at Historical Fiction Obsession
Wednesday, September 21st
Author Interview at Historical Fiction Obsession
Friday, September 23rd
Review at Rundpinne
Monday, September 26th
About Eromenos
SYNOPSIS
Eros and Thanatos converge in the story of a glorious youth, an untimely death, and an imperial love affair that gives rise to the last pagan god of antiquity. In this coming-of-age novel set in the second century AD, Antinous of Bithynia, a Greek youth from Asia Minor, recounts his seven-year affair with Hadrian, fourteenth emperor of Rome. In a partnership more intimate than Hadrian's sanctioned political marriage to Sabina, Antinous captivates the most powerful ruler on earth both in life and after death.
This version of the affair between the emperor and his beloved ephebe vindicates the youth scorned by early Christian church fathers as a "shameless and scandalous boy" and "sordid and loathsome instrument of his master's lust." EROMENOS envisions the personal history of the young man who achieved apotheosis as a pagan god of antiquity, whose cult of worship lasted for hundreds of years far longer than the cult of the emperor Hadrian.
In EROMENOS, the young man Antinous, whose beautiful image still may be found in museums around the world, finds a voice of his own at last.
Publication Date: March 11, 2011
Publisher: Seriously Good Books
176 pages
Read Excerpt HERE.
Praise for Eromenos
What is the nature of love? Of control? These big questions without easy answers are the heart of the book, as we watch Antinous come to his own conclusions about both.
No one knows what happened to the real Antinous. All that is known is that he drowned in the Nile and then Hadrian deified him. McDonald has given us the imaginary voice of a young man whose image has been immortalized in busts and sculptures, a young man who may very well have been as haunted as his death is mysterious.
--FOREWORD review
Intelligent, deeply-felt historical fiction like Eromenos is rare enough even in this new golden age of the genre. McDonald has honed her narrative until every phrase glitters. The machinations of other court favorites, the richly-detailed period atmosphere, the wary yet compulsive attraction between the emperor and Antinous all are so richly and intelligently evoked that readers are swept along, forgetting that they already know how this particular story turns out. Eromenos is one of the finest historical novels I've read in many years. Readers are urged not to miss it.
--Historical Novel Society Online Review, May 2011
Praise for Eromenos
What is the nature of love? Of control? These big questions without easy answers are the heart of the book, as we watch Antinous come to his own conclusions about both.
No one knows what happened to the real Antinous. All that is known is that he drowned in the Nile and then Hadrian deified him. McDonald has given us the imaginary voice of a young man whose image has been immortalized in busts and sculptures, a young man who may very well have been as haunted as his death is mysterious.
--FOREWORD review
Intelligent, deeply-felt historical fiction like Eromenos is rare enough even in this new golden age of the genre. McDonald has honed her narrative until every phrase glitters. The machinations of other court favorites, the richly-detailed period atmosphere, the wary yet compulsive attraction between the emperor and Antinous all are so richly and intelligently evoked that readers are swept along, forgetting that they already know how this particular story turns out. Eromenos is one of the finest historical novels I've read in many years. Readers are urged not to miss it.
--Historical Novel Society Online Review, May 2011
About Melanie McDonald
She has an MFA from the University of Arkansas. Her short stories have appeared in New York Stories, Fugue, Indigenous Fiction, and online. An Arkansas native whose Campbell ancestors were Highland Scots, she now lives in Virginia with her husband, Kevin McDonald, the author of Above the Clouds: Managing Risk in the World of Cloud Computing.
For more information, please visit Melanie McDonald's WEBSITE.
*reposting comment that was accidentally deleted*
ReplyDeleteFrom Blodeuedd...
Liz already read the book and sent me a review. I knew it was the right call to send it to her :D
I just found your blog today, and there's so much to explore. Love the Quote of the Week!
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