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This is the web site of author Steven Saylor. Click here to visit the Home Page. |
Archive Page
A miscellany of items that were previously featured on the Home Page of Steven’s site.
Some links may no longer be active.
First, some blasts from the past…
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| While visiting Murder by the Book in Houston recently, Steven spotted this vintage snap of the young author in the very same shop, circa 1992. Current value of that stack of ultra-rare signed Roman Blood hardbacks: upwards of $30,000. Value of lost youth: priceless. |
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| The 2010 Bouchercon (World Mystery Convention) took place in San Francisco, where Steven appeared on a panel with fellow Ancient World mystery authors Lindsey Davis, Gary Corby (the tall Aussie), and John Maddox Roberts (at right). In the red shirt is our moderator and Steven’s longtime editor, Keith Kahla of St. Martin’s Press. Photo by Ginny Lindzey. |
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| In 2008 Steven went to Lisbon to speak at the International Conference on the Ancient Novel (read his talk here), and also met with readers at the Bertrand Bookstore, including novelist Fernando Miguel Santos. |
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Steven with the late Ruth Rendell in London, 2002. |
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Book tours in 2007 and 2008 took Steven across the USA and to England, Norway, Hungary, Portugal, and Spain. Steven’s Spanish publisher scored some great publicity for ROMA, including this window display in downtown Madrid. |
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April 2007: Steven’s ROMA signing at BookPeople in Austin was SRO — with Romans in attendance! These ancient world aficionados are from The Roman Way. |
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September 2006: Steven played host on his rooftop terrace to Caroline Lawrence, author of the Roman Mysteries children’s series (including The Thieves of Ostia.) Lawrence lives in London, but came to Berkeley (her alma mater) while traveling in the States. |
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Halloween 2003: Steven (with Rick Solomon at right) felt positively imperial when he reigned as Guest of Honor at a gathering of Ancient Worlds enthusiasts in New Orleans. |
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There’s no experience quite like signing books in front of an Egyptian sphinx, as Steven discovered when he spoke at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology in Philadelphia in January 2003. (photo by Rick Solomon) |
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During his 2002 book tour of England, Steven was cordially welcomed by fellow author Lindsey Davis at her lovely home in Greenwich, outside London. Their mutual friend, author Deryn Lake, witnessed the historic meeting. (photo by Rick Solomon) |
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•Tuesday, March 25, 10 a.m. Listen for a brief interview with Steven on John Aielli’s Eklektikos show on KUTX 98.9 FM in Austin. |
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...Plus some upcoming •Tuesday, March 18, 7 p.m. Steven will appear at Books Inc in the Castro in San Francisco. |
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Steven’s essay “Why I Write” appeared in Publishers Weekly. Read it here. | Whatever happened to Steven’s favorite Golden Age whodunnit author, Stuart Palmer? Read Steven’s appreciation of Palmer and his classic spinster-schoolmarm-sleuth Hildegarde Withers here. |
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In 2012, Łukasz Dudek created cover art and illustrations for Steven’s novel Rubicon. The work was created for college credit, not publication, as Dudek’s graduation project at PJWSTK (the Polish-Japanese Institute of IT) in Bytom, Poland. (Rubicon was already available in a Polish edition from Rebis.) Steven says: “I really like these illustrations, especially the last one.” You can view the whole album at Steven’s facebook page. |
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UK-Hungary Book Tour
May 20-June 4, 2011 |
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| UK: To celebrate the UK paperback of Empire (releasing May 26), Steven is attending Crimefest in Bristol, with two panel appearances on Friday, May 20. He’ll also speak at the University of Hull on Tuesday, May 24, hosted by the Philip Larkin Centre for Creative Writing. [Update: you can watch Steven’s interview at the Larkin Centre streaming online here.] There may be some last-minute additons (perhaps an appearance in London, plus radio and print interviews); the best place to check for updates will be Steven’s facebook page. |
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Hungary: Steven lesz az Agave Könyvek vendége a 2011. június 2-6. között megrendezésre kerülő 82. Ünnepi Könyvhéten. • Június 1., 18 óra: dedikálás az Allee Könyváruházban, Libri (1117 Budapest, Váli u. 3.); Facebook oldalunkon • Június 4., 11 óra: dedikálás a 82. Ünnepi Könyvhéten az Agave Könyvek standján (1051 Budapest, Vörösmarty tér); Facebook oldalunkon • A Facebook oldalunkon folyamatosan lehet tájékozódni a látogatással és a programokkal kapcsolatban.
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A Mist of Prophecies has just been released in a beautiful new trade paperback edition, now in bookstores or available from Amazon or Barnes & Noble. Only one more volume to go, and the entire Roma Sub Rosa® series will be available in matching editions! Steven likes the dramatic cover art on this one—a tale of espionage and intrigue among the women of Rome, who fight their own secret battles while Caesar and Pompey wage war in distant lands. |
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Last year saw the publication of the massive hardback anthology Warriors, which included an original Steven Saylor story, “The Eagle and the Rabbit,” set in the aftermath of Rome’s destruction of Carthage. The anthology was so massive that it’s being split into multiple volumes for paperback publication; Steven’s story is in Warriors 1, along with tales by Robert Silverberg, George R.R. Martin, Cecelia Holland, Tad Williams, and Joe Haldeman. Available from Amazon or Barnes & Noble.
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The new trade paperback edition of Last Seen in Massilia is now in bookstores or available from Amazon or Barnes & Noble. Only two more volumes to go, and the entire Roma Sub Rosa® series will be available in matching editions. Steven likes the dramatic cover art on this one—a tale of wartime espionage and intrigue in a city under siege, as Gordianus searches for his missing son, who was last seen in Massilia. |
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What is Steven reading right now? “I’ve been watching movies by one of the world’s most fascinating directors, Joseph Losey. (Netflix Instant Viewing currently offers some very early, hard-to-find Losey movies.) To delve further into the Losey landscape, I’m reading Conversations with Losey, an inspiring and insightful collection of interviews. Losey lived from 1909 to 1984 and had a remarkable career, moving from Hollywood to London because of the Blacklist and working with everyone from Bertolt Brecht to Liz Taylor; his most famous collaborations were with Dirk Bogarde and Nobel Prize winner Harold Pinter. Shown here is a poster for one of my favorite movies, Boom!, Losey’s 1968 collaboration with Tennessee Williams.”
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What is Steven reading right now? “For relaxation, I’ve been turning less to fiction lately and more to academic works that take me down unexpected by-ways of history. Beauty and the Male Body in Byzantium fits the bill perfectly. I’ve long been fascinated by the Byzantines (the Christian successors of Rome, centered in Constantinople). This short tome on a rather specialized topic is a small but beautifully produced book with lots of illustrations. Would you believe I was the first person to check it out from the UC Berkeley Library?” |
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Steven’s Italian bookshop is now open for business! Now that Amazon finally has an Italian site, Steven has linked to his Italian editions to create Steven Saylor Italia, where you can find the adventures of Gordiano il Cercatore, links to online interviews with Steven in Italian, and convenient links to Amazon.it. (Finally, an easy way to buy all those Sword & Sandal DVDs from Italy!)
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WARRIORS ed. by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois includes a new story by Seven Saylor; “The Eagle and the Rabbit” is set in 146 B.C., as Roman slave traders track down the last scattered survivors after the destruction of Carthage. Reviewers cite it as one of the best stories in the 726-page collection (FantasyLiterature.com; TrueReview) and “not to be missed” (BSCreview.com). Coincidentally, there’s another tale about Rome v. Carthage in the anthology, “The Triumph” by Robin Hobb, plus new stories by Diana Gabaldon, Peter S. Beagle, Joe Haldeman, Joe R. Lansdale, Lawrence Block, Robert Silverberg, and many more. |
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Do the precepts of ancient Greek drama influence modern movies? Steven sees the hand of the ancient Greeks at work in Oscar Best Picture nominee Toy Story 3: “Pixar knocked it out of the ballpark with this one. Most amazing to me is the film’s intensely dramatic climax, which not only follows Aristotle’s dictum that drama should evoke terror and pity in the audience, but ends with the appearance of that ancient Greek stage device, the deus ex machina—literally. Brilliant!” (Spoiler: the squeeze toy aliens not only worship the crane claw, they use it as a last-minute rescue device—making it both a literal and figurative deus ex machina.) |
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Steven is grateful to the folks at Musica Romana in Germany, who sent him their CD entitled Pugnate, music for the arena and gladiator games. Accompanying the disk is a deluxe booklet (in German) which describes the group’s creative process and shows the various musical instruments they play—including a genuine reconstruction of a Roman water organ. |
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Fascinated by Greek tragedy? “The Art of Ancient Greek Theater” in on view at The Getty Villa in Malibu through January 3, 2011. • “Cleopatra: Search for the Last Queen of Egypt,” mounted by National Geographic, explores the mystique of Cleopatra and underwater ruins of her capital, Alexandria; the exhibit is on view through 2010 at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. • The touring exhibit “Heroes: Mortals & Myths in Ancient Greece” makes its final appearance at the Onassis Cultural Center in New York, through January 3, 2011; admission is free. Steven saw the show when it was in San Diego and highly recommends it.
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Check out the free Ancient Rome Refocused podcasts at iTunes, where Rob Cain explores the relationship of Ancient Rome to the modern world. (Episode 4 is an interview with Steven about the Roman triumph and his novel The Triumph of Caesar.) Cain also blogs and podcasts at his Ancient Rome Refocused Web site. |
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In October 2010, Steven was honored to deliver a brief introduction to a live performance of Athens v. Sparta at the Hyde Park Theater in Austin; you can read his intro here. AvS combines readings from Thuycidides’ History of the Peloponnesian War with a suite of original rock songs. The combination of grim narration, ethereal music, and trenchant lyrics is spellbinding. The official AvS site is here, and you can hear the whole album here. You can also hear samples and download from Amazon or from
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Sitsim (Situated Simulation): Is this the virtual reality of the future—and ancient past? See a demo (and tour the Roman Forum) at YouTube. |
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A reader from Frankfurt contacted Steven at facebook to let him know that The Judgment of Caesar inspired her to write a musical meditation on the lighthouse of Alexandria. “Let me take you back in time to 48 B.C. You were a Roman traveler...in search of alternative cures for the minds and bodies of your people. After a month in the turbulent Mediterranean Sea, in this night, you looked to the distance, and on the horizon you finally saw what seems to be the lighthouse of the city of Alexandria...” Listen here. |
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Steven recently had a change of heart about Wikipedia, from eye-rolling skeptic to active contributor. “For better or worse,” he says, “this is the well, and we might as well work to make the water as pure and plentiful as possible.” Toward that end, his latest endeavor is a complete rewrite of the entry for Aesop. “Everybody ‘knows’ Aesop, yet nobody knows Aesop,” says Steven. Was he ugly and deformed? Was he a black African? Did he actually live at all? And did he really have a son named Aesop Jr., as seen on “The Bullwinkle Show”? Steven found the research fascinating.
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Exploring all the free stuff at iTunes, Steven came across Mike Duncan’s weekly History of Rome podcasts. To download these podcasts (free!) click here: |
Steven’s 35th high school reunion in Goldthwaite, Texas, put him in mind of the mystery novel he once wrote set in a small town in Texas, Have You Seen Dawn? Read more about it here.
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Steven’s story “Kinder, Gentler” from 1989 is in A Casualty of War: The Arcadia Book of Gay Short Stories. US • UK |
Read Steven’s first published work (at age 14), the short story “Season of Guilt.”
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The new trade paperback edition of The House of the Vestals (the first collection of Gordianus short stories) is now in US bookstores. It’s designed to match the new uniform Roma Sub Rosa® editions, and Steven loves the cover: “I was never crazy about the old US cover, which seemed to show Gordianus, looking a bit like yours truly, wearing a monk’s cowl à la Brother Cadfael. Since one of my publisher’s sales reps once told me that, in general, a cover with a female outsells a cover without, I thought: the book is called The House of the Vestals—duh, where are the Vestals? At last, we have Vestals!” Click here to compare the two covers. |
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Ben Hur Live, a multi-media spectacle featuring a live chariot race and a full-size Roman galley, is touring arenas across Europe. Will it ever cross the Atlantic? See pix and a trailer for the London run here; see a picture gallery from the Düesseldorf engagement here. |  |
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This has “collector’s item” written all over it: a book of original short stories about Rome v. Carthage titled Hannibal Ante Portas! This labor of love is the creation of two Romanian brothers, Cristian Emilian Ghita (who edited the volume and contributed two of the stories) and Catilin Daniel Ghita, who provided illustrations. The paperback edition is text only; the deluxe hardback edition is sumptuously illustrated in color with insets, borders, and full-page images. See excerpts, images, and more info at this forum. |
8 January 2013: Just notified Scribd of 17 copyright violations at their site (unauthorized uploads of my novels and short story collections). Here’s the text of my email sent to copyright@scribd.com: Attn: Copyright Agent, Scribd, Inc. Pursuant to 17 USC 512(c)(3)(A), this communication serves as a statement that: I am the exclusive rights holder for the novels listed below. No work with my byline "by Steven Saylor" or with my trademarked series title "Roma sub Rosa" should ever be uploaded at Scribd. Steven Saylor These 17 violations of copyright should be removed immediately from your site: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. [end of list]
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What’s the heck is going on at Internet Archive? |
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This is the web site of author Steven Saylor. Click here to visit the Home Page. |