Overview
If I'd never hoped to live in a world of goodness and truth—if the priestess of Diana, then Leander, and Joanna, hadn't shown me glimpses of it—maybe I wouldn't have minded being shut out of it. Maybe the preacher's death wouldn't have trapped me in a dungeon, the dungeon of my own self.
Her name is Salome. You may think you know her story—how her seductive Dance of the Seven Veils led to the beheading of John the Baptist. But you don't know it from her side. You don't know how a web of betrayal, and greed, and desire was spun around an innocent teenage girl. How she came to doubt her own mother. How she searched for a friend in an unfamiliar land. And how she walked into a trap that changed the course of history.
This is Salome's story, in her own words. Listen, and learn of strength, of power, of loyalty—and of death.
Editorials
Publishers Weekly
In this evocative novel based on biblical events, Gormley (C.S. Lewis: The Man Behind Narnia) fleshes out the beguiling story of Salome that has captivated artists and writers for centuries. Readers meet Salome, granddaughter to King Herod of Judea (the one whose actions brought about the celebration of Passover), at age 14, dreaming of becoming a dancer in the Temple of Diana in Rome. Soon her uncle Antipas visits and woos her mother, Herodias, away from Salome's father, Herod Junior, to begin a new life in Judea. As the novel progresses, Salome begins to develop into an independent-minded, if still uncertain, young woman, drawn to those who live principled lives. The tragedy unfolds when "John the Baptizer" condemns the marriage of Herod and Herodias as adulterous, provoking the wrath of Salome's self-absorbed mother. Gormley's retelling weaves a plausible and harrowing description of how in one fateful night Salome becomes a vessel of her mother's avaricious desires. Salome remains a sympathetic character as she repents her part in the beheading of John the Baptist, and is redeemed through her generous acts. Gormley subtly depicts the larger forces at work (e.g., just before John is led to his execution, he learns that his cousin, Yeshua of Nazareth, is "the One Who Is to Come," and goes peacefully to his death). The author's rendering of Salome's reflection on the events are appropriately prophetic: "Maybe, in years to come, the story of the Baptizer's death would be the only thing that anyone remembered about me." Ages 12-up. (Apr.)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business InformationVOYA -
Salome's glamorous, selfish mother Herodias has her eyes set on a powerful new husband-Antipas, her former brother-in-law. Although already married, Antipas sends his wife away so that he might wed Herodias. Salome knows nothing of her Jewish heritage and beliefs, wanting only to serve in the temple of Diana. Insecure Herodias feels threatened when John the Baptist denounces her adulterous marriage. She seizes the opportunity for revenge at a banquet given by Antipas. Salome, a last-minute replacement dancer, is wrapped in veils that slowly drop away. Her exotic appearance and dance so inflames her stepfather that he offers a reward of up to half his kingdom. Instead of asking to return to Greece, she impulsively yields to her mother's request for John's head on a platter. Horrified by her own and others' reactions to the killing, Salome begins doing small acts of kindness for strangers, a form of the repentance that John preached, eventually leaving to marry Antipas's gentle brother Philip and start a new life. Beyond the infamous dance and its terrible results, little is known of Salome. Gormley creates a compassionate portrait of a girl uprooted from a familiar life, torn between wanting to please her mother and living her own life. She prevents Herodias and Antipas from becoming villainous stereotypes while keeping John as a very minor character. Joanna, another biblical character, is sympathetic to Salome, almost mother-like. Jesus hovers just outside the story despite Salome's frantic search for him after John's death.KLIATT -
Perhaps most of us know the story of Salome, who danced before Herod and demanded the head of John the Baptist as a reward. If we don't know it from Sunday school, then we know it from art history—all those paintings of that beheaded saint. Well, perhaps as a nod to the recent interest in women from our religious traditions, Gormley gives us a detailed historical novel about Salome, and in a note at the end, summarizes the brief facts known about her from historical accounts. (There is even a coin with her face on it, issued by her second husband, Aristobolus of Calchis in Syria.) The fictionalized story of Salome reads like a Roman soap opera, with ghastly relatives making unreasonable demands on a young girl. Salome is portrayed as innocent and well-meaning, the pawn of her evil mother. Events shift from Rome to Tiberias, and John the Baptist and his cousin Yeshua have their roles to play in the story. YAs would have to have a strong interest in the period of this novel to persevere: the convoluted maneuvering of evil rulers like Herod Antipas and his lover, Salome's mother, are detailed and nasty. Gormley reconstructs these biblical times with care. She turns Salome into a sympathetic character and makes us think of other despots who rule cruelly.School Library Journal
Gr 6-8
In the Bible, the infamous Salome asks for the head of John the Baptist after her provocative dance at the birthday of her stepfather, Herod. This absorbing novel re-creates the events surrounding her coldhearted request. Jewish by birth but raised in Rome, Salome wants nothing more than to become a priestess at the temple of Diana. Instead, her manipulative mother, who divorced Salome's father and married Herod Antipas, the ruler of the Jewish people in Tiberias, takes her to her new home far from Rome. At this point in her life, Salome is beginning to notice the intricacies of political life, the selfishness of the ruling classes, and the potential that each person has for good and evil. Eventually, she is caught between the machinations of her insecure, self-centered mother and the desires of her lecherous stepfather, and in a moment of panic, she does what her mother desires-she asks for John's head. Gormley effectively captures the confusion of an unhappy adolescent and the shallowness of her narcissistic mother in a well-plotted tale that keeps readers engaged. Though most of the book is about Salome, a few chapters are told from the point of view of John. These chapters, as well as some of the events in the story, convey clearly the message that John, and later Yeshua, are preaching, a message unsettling to those in power. Many of the questions that the book raises are still being grappled with today, and as a result, the novel will appeal to thoughtful readers as well as to those who simply want to lose themselves in a good story.
—Barbara ScottoCopyright 2006 Reed Business Information.