GIULIA

A daughter of a Roman emperor is exiled to an isolated island where she reflects on the ruins of her life in Driscoll’s debut historical novel.

Giulia is the 37-year-old daughter of Caesar Augustus, but her life has been a punishing one; she was forced into a politically motivated marriage with her brother, Tiberius, a cruel man who subjected her to horrible abuse. Also, her two previous husbands died, and her eagerly anticipated child with Tiberius was stillborn. Later, she’s caught in an embarrassing indiscretion and charged by her own father with a “wanton love of spirits and licentious behaviour”—an offense against public morality. She’s ignominiously exiled for five years to an isolated island, Pandateria, an “earthly paradise” to some but to her a “living hell.” It’s made even worse by the fact that her personal servant, Phoebe, a faithful friend, is so burdened by guilt about Giulia’s fate that she commits suicide. Driscoll tells this tale—which is, by turns, soap-operatically dramatic and affectingly poignant—not only from Giulia’s point of view, but also from those of her servants, and the result is a complex, kaleidoscopic perspective. Giulia’s inimitable style of narration is plainly declarative and irreverent, by turns: “Speculation has it that our arranged marriage was the catalyst that triggered [Tiberius’] peculiar behaviour and his increasing lust for virgins and young boys. I can attest that…his perverse acts of sexual deviance and cruelty are nothing new. I have bite marks to prove this.” Her crew of servants is intriguing, as well, led by Damaris, a young woman whose foot was run over by a carriage in Rome and who’s happy to leave behind the clamor and bustle of that city behind her.

A sometimes-moving and narratively inventive portrait of a member of the Roman imperial family.