Ever the Same:

by Ursula Strauss

A National Geographic photo of a victim of Mount Vesuvius’s 79 A.D. eruption emerges. Her blond hair intact and the remains of a fetus within her skeletonized body suggested the woman’s northern origin and probable slave status. Emperor Augustus had closed the Empire’s borders a century before, inadvertently creating a shortage of free labor. Foreign females of childbearing age were now being kidnapped to brood slave babies for the booming economy. Ever the Same explores the history of that period, the immutable foibles of human nature and especially, the exploitation of females, freeborn or slave, whose roles were systematically restricted to pleasuring men and producing offspring. Ursa, a fair-haired warrior-princess whose Teutonic tribe has been enslaved, is escorted to Rome by Antonius, a young cavalry officer. They fall in love en route, but she is forced to wed a lecherous, middle-aged senator from Pompeii who requires a male heir. Now living in the shadow of treacherous Mount Vesuvius, the contrast between denigrating Roman attitudes toward females and those of her respectful Teutonic tribe drives her to desperation. When she finds herself pregnant with Antonius’s child, she and her maid servant hatch a daring plan to shield it from the vengeance of her still unsuspecting husband.

144 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 25, 2012