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The Bearkeeper Daughter Gillian Bradshaw Books

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The Bearkeeper Daughter Gillian Bradshaw Books

Theodora, the empire’s most powerful woman learns she has a long-lost son—and chooses not to tell her husband, who isn’t the father, but does happen to be the emperor. Instead, she gives her son, John, a false identity as well opportunities to determine his worth. But as she weaves John’s ongoing successes into her larger plans of finalizing family politics, enemies jealous of what appears to be her inappropriate favoritism investigate John. But after that threat unravels, a member of John’s “other” family accidentally arrives with the real truth. Yet it all works out. Another historical page-turner from Gillian Bradshaw, one of my favorite authors.


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The Bearkeeper Daughter Gillian Bradshaw Books Reviews

This novel should be entitled "The Grandson of the Bearkeeper" because the main character of the story is Juan, the bastard son of the Empress Theodora. It is a soft story about a young man who learned after the dead of his father the origin of his mother and went to Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire where his mother is the omnipotent ruler of the empire and has to learn the habits and protocol of the court in order to pleased Theodora who has great plans for him. Through the pages of the novel, the extinguished empire get alive again and the reader can take a walk for the streets of Constantinople, once the center of the Byzantine art, culture and the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire later known as the Byzantine Empire.
I originally read this book hoping it would shed more light on the life of Empress Theodora, who was a bearkeeper's daughter and circus actress/whore during the late Roman Empire (in Constantinople). Justinian, the emperor-to-be, fell in love with her, and shortly after they were married they were crowned emperor and empress (in the same arena where she once performed her circus tricks).
Although Bradshaw's novel is a well-written piece of historical fiction, her story focuses on Theodora's alleged bastard son, John. The reader, along with John, meets a much older Theodora near the end of her reign. The book follows John's rise from scribe to army commander to consul of the palace guard, describing in rich detail the quality of life in the Roman Empire circa 530 A.D.
However, it offers few glimpses into Theodora's childhood or her rise to power. So while it was a good read, the book's title is deceptive.
Gillian Bradshaw does a nice job with "Bearkeeper's Daughter" (Houghton Mifflin, $18.95, 310 pages) but it's definitely not a knock-your-reading-glasses-off story about Constantinople in the time of Justinian and Theodora.

The plot moves by the numbers -- the romance is telegraphed from the beginning -- but it's reasonably well done and there's some nice detail about life in the sixth century CE. Bradshaw is a prolific writer, and there are a lot of her books out there, but after reading this one, I have to say I'm not going to track any others down. But if one dropped into my lap on a plane flight, I'd have no problem opening it up to page one.
read long ago. her research is always excellent and her details are well chosen
As described. Great book
Gillian Bradshaw writes historical fiction that that nearly seamless. Her narrative is exciting and clear. The mis-en-scene of her historical novels is excellent. You know what it looks like and feels like in those ancient streets and you smell the markets and see the color of the air.

Theodora was anything but a likely candidate to become empress of the Byzantines, but it happened. This story reveals the underworkings of such politics, the weaknesses of the men in high places, and the lack of restaint in those who aspire to power.

Bradshaw does not write a bad book. Her work is exciting, edifying, and most worthwhile.
The Bearkeeper's Daughter, by historical novelist Gillian Bradshaw, is a fresh and wonderful look at 6th Century Byzantium. By this point in time Imperial Rome was gone; under the heel of conquering tribes. The basic government of Imperial Rome had moved to Byzantium, but had changed in ways that the Romans would never had understood. (One major change is that the main language of the upper classes is Greek---Latin and the Romans have faded into obscurity.)

There is an Emperor in this time period Justinian, and his wife, the Empress, the commoner Theordora, daughter of a circus bearkeeper. Imperial government is handled by a large complex bureocracy, with eunuchs among the main "powers behind the throne."

Not to give away the plot it is based loosely on an incident written about by a diarist of the times. More important than the actual plot, is the view we get of life in a powerful Empire, already Christian, but with constant feuds, often bloody, over minutae of religious doctrine.

The story is seen through the eyes of John, a young man from a small town in what would now be one of the Arabic desert kingdoms. He sees the Imperial capitol with the same wide-eyed wonder of a small town boy in any time or place. His life and the events of his time in Byzantium are the basis of the story.
Theodora, the empire’s most powerful woman learns she has a long-lost son—and chooses not to tell her husband, who isn’t the father, but does happen to be the emperor. Instead, she gives her son, John, a false identity as well opportunities to determine his worth. But as she weaves John’s ongoing successes into her larger plans of finalizing family politics, enemies jealous of what appears to be her inappropriate favoritism investigate John. But after that threat unravels, a member of John’s “other” family accidentally arrives with the real truth. Yet it all works out. Another historical page-turner from Gillian Bradshaw, one of my favorite authors.