Daughter of the Gods A Novel of Ancient Egypt

Stephanie Thornton — 2014

Egypt, 1400s BC. The pharaoh's pampered second daughter, lively, intelligent Hatshepsut, delights in racing her chariot through the marketplace and testing her archery skills in the Nile's marshlands. But the death of her elder sister, Neferubity, in a gruesome accident arising from Hatshepsut's games forces her to confront her guilt...and sets her on a profoundly changed course. Hatshepsut enters a loveless marriage with her half brother, Thut, to secure his claim to the Isis Throne and produce a male heir. But it is another of Thut's wives, the commoner Aset, who bears him a son, while Hatshepsut develops a searing attraction for his brilliant adviser Senenmut. And when Thut suddenly dies, Hatshepsut becomes de facto ruler, as regent to her two-year-old nephew. Once, Hatshepsut anticipated being free to live and love as she chose. Now she must put Egypt first. Ever daring, she will lead a vast army and build great temples, but always she will be torn between the demands of leadership and the desires of her heart. And even as she makes her boldest move of all, her enemies will plot her downfall.... Once again, Stephanie Thornton brings to life a remarkable woman from the distant past whose willingness to defy tradition changed the course of history.

Reviews

Jennifer@vivaldi

Dec 14, 2021

An emotionally devastating tale that is set in Ancient Egypt. Stephanie Thornton's Daughter of the Gods brings the life of Hatshepsut in a tremendous amount of details and emotional complexity. There's a pattern that what we are accustomed of in history are all told through a very male-dominated voice. Because of this, the lives of great women who had made a difference were silenced or forgotten. What's impressive with Daughter of the Gods is how much nuance and dimensionality Hatshepsut has in the novel. Her characterisation conveys both the role of being a female (specifically, wife of a Pharaoh) as well as the complex emotional conflicts that she had experienced over the years. Thornton also excelled at the historical research in the novel. With the amount of historical details, I found the Egyptian backdrop immersive. It's lush and the way Thornton described the scenes shines like gold & silver! While I commanded the historical details, I personally thought the pacing of the novel was kind of bogged down. Even though the characterisation is very well done, I felt like I still had to push pretty hard through the first 100 pages. Again, I think this is primarily because I'm normally not a fan when it comes to info-dumping historical details in novels. Aside from this concern, I still found the narrative in Daughter of the Gods pretty well fleshed out. It's what makes this book such a heartbreaking one to read. If you enjoy well fleshed out narratives of forgotten women in history and historical fiction that excels at background research, this book is definitely for you! N.B. This book contains following triggering content: childbirth, grief / loss of loved ones, death, physical violence, and corpse (3.5 stars out of 5)

Cat@catastrophe

Jan 13, 2022