Abduction of a Slave, the fourth Eye of Isis novel (see below for the first three plus buy links, natch) launches on the previous Saturday, January 25, at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore. If you can’t attend in person you can watch on Facebook Live and YouTube, and you can preorder your signed first edition right here. They ship.

…otherwise known as me going on again about the joys and sorrows of researching the Eye of Isis novels, set in Alexandria in the time of Cleopatra.

Any writer will tell you that of all the research we do, maybe one percent of it makes it into a book. If you are foolish enough take up writing knowing full well that you will be embracing rejection as a way of life (© Dana Stabenow), be it known from there on out you will spend a lot of time researching on line and a lot more time (in my case at least) finding and scouring books for that one little detail that will inform an entire plot. It happens often enough to encourage us to keep doing it.

For example, I recently read The Earth Transformed: An Untold History by Peter Frankopan, of which I wrote as follows:

For the rag-tag-and-bobtail amateur historian, intent only on cherry-picking those tiny details that will spark an idea for a plot or flesh out a scene set two thousand years before, there is no greater gift than a good index. Here is one such. In preparation for writing the fourth Eye of Isis novel I went immediately to the back of the book and looked up Egypt. The very first entry was ‘branding of slaves, 179.” Back to page 179 I went, where I found

Common ideas evolved about beliefs and practices too. For example, tattooing has long been practised in human history, with cases in the Tyrolean Alps and the Chinchorro culture in South America and references in Chinese texts such as the Shang Shu revealing that tattooing on bodies was not only known across continents but dates back thousands of years. Over time, however, tattoos became indicators of something different. In Chinese societies, tattooing was thought of as something done by barbarians and not by ‘civilised’ people. Further west, however, it became synonymous with slavery specifically. Prisoners of war, captiaves and enslaved peoples in Egypt and Mesopotamia were branded with the name of the religious sect of their owner…Greeks who were captured during the wars against the Persians in the fifth century BC were tattooed by their captors, something that Athenians and others did to those they vanquished in the Aegean and as far away as Sicily.

Really. As far away as Sicily. Hmm. Possibly even as far away as…Alexandria. After all, Alexandria was founded and built by Greeks, in the footsteps of the Pharaohs, who definitely brought home more than their share of captives from foreign wars–they brag about it in carved murals on the sides of their temples. Slavery was alive and well in 47 BC, pirates made a living off it, and then there was that little titbit of information I ran across somewhere else that the Roman troops in Alexandria under Gabinius got pissed when they weren’t paid and started pillaging and plundering the surrounding countryside to supply their wants. I read elsewhere how Caesar was always so anxious to grab as much loot and land as he could because he was constantly in arrears with his own troops, and they could and did act out.

So it could not have been a very long step for disaffected Roman troops to move into, say, piracy, ransom, and trafficking in slaves, who in my fevered imagination would be tattooed with the number of the legion to which their captors belonged. Bet you a denarius that happened.

And, yes, about one percent of all of this made it into the fourth Eye of Isis novel.

Death of an Eye  introduces us to Tetisheri, lifelong friend of Cleopatra, the Lady of Two Lands and ruler of Egypt. The queen’s Eye is struck down in the streets of Alexandria and Cleopatra tasks her friend to find the murderer and bring them to justice.

Disappearance of a Scribe  Tetisheri’s first official case as the new Eye of Isis. A scribe goes missing and leads to an investigation of corruption, bribery, and murder in Alexandria’s building trades.

Theft of an Idol   The most popular actor in Alexandria is kidnapped and the queen asks Tetisheri find her and return her to her adoring fans. The journey takes Tetisheri and the Five Soldiers to Memphis, deep into the depravity and degradation of the eldest temple and even deeper into the heart of the tombs of the dead.

Chatter Eye of Isis Uncategorized Abduction of a Slave Ancient Rome Battle of Thapsus Eye of Isis 4