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Casati's follow-up to her powerful debut, Clytemnestra (2023), is a similarly piercing exploration of an equally complicated woman, Semiramis, an orphaned girl who transformed herself into a powerful Assyrian queen in the eighth century BCE. Raised in a modest village by a shepherd, Semiramis is plotting her escape as a teenager when the arrival of a handsome new governor, Onnes, provides the opportunity she's seeking. As secretive and emotionally scarred as she is, Onnes is a perfect match for Semiramis, and he brings her back to the capital of Kalhu to wed. Complicating matters is the king, Ninus, Onnes' best friend, who is harboring feelings for him that go beyond platonic comradeship. But when Semiramis joins the Assyrian army in battle, she and Ninus find themselves drawn to each other romantically. Casati renders the ancient world Semiramis inhabits in vivid detail, bringing in the perspective of a slave in her household, and together, the pair illustrates the influence even the most unlikely actors can have on history. Casati's compelling second outing portraying the Assyrian empire's only queen, is another triumph.

Publishers Weekly
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Casati (Clytemnestra) chronicles the ruthless rise of Assyrian queen Semiramis in this masterful saga. In 823 BCE, the Assyrian empire is in the midst of a civil war between Assur and Ninus, two opposing sons of the late King Shalmaneser. The conflict extends to Eber-Nari, the western province where Semiramis was raised by Simmas, a shepherd, after she was abandoned as an infant by her mother, who then died by suicide. The fearless and resourceful Semiramis views Shalmaneser’s illegitimate son, Onnes, as a way out of her harsh life, and after framing the abusive Simmas for theft, she persuades Onnes to take her as his wife to the capital city of Kalhu. There, Semiramis continues to challenge norms, training in combat and navigating palace intrigue fomented by Ninus’s mother and by a rival for power who commands the Assyrian army. Five years after Semiramis leaves Eber-Nari, the Assyrians come under threat from Babylonia, and her machinations culminate in her becoming Assyria’s leader. Casati excels at depicting the stark brutality of the period, contrasting matter-of-fact descriptions of impalings and mutilations with Semiramis’s determination to survive: “To die is to travel to the land of no return. She has seen that land from afar: it waits for her every time her father strikes her.” No matter how much cruelty Semiramis dispenses, Casati never loses sight of what drives her heroine to achieve a status where she need not obey anyone else. Admirers of Robert Graves’s Claudius novels will be riveted. (Jan.)