Stealing Fire (31 page)

reading group guide

1. What is your first impression of Lydias and how does that change or not change in the course of the book?
   
2. Fatherhood is very important to several of the characters in the book. How do Ptolemy, Artashir, and Lydias exemplify fatherhood? What are the characteristics of good fathers, and how are they the same or different from one another?
   
3. In Persia, Bagoas is considered to be a third gender, neither male nor female. In Egypt, there is no third gender. How does Bagoas cope with this change? How do we look at gender today? Is our view simpler or more complicated than Lydias’ world?
   
4. If Ptolemy and Alexander knew for years that they were really half brothers, how did this affect their relationship? Who else do you think knew, besides their parents? How do you think growing up in Alexander's shadow affected Ptolemy?
   
5. Lydias in
   Stealing Fire
   was Gull in
   Black Ships
   in a previous life, and will be Charmian in
   Hand of Isis
   . How do you think the different incarnations are similar? How are they different?
   
6. At the beginning of
   Stealing Fire
   , Lydias is grieving the death of his wife and son, and also the death of Hephaistion and his beloved horse. Over the course of the book, he comes to terms with his losses. Why do you think he decides to build a new life? What are the decisive moments in coming to terms with his grief?
   
7. In
   Stealing Fire
   we see several different models of marriage—Lydias’ marriage to Sati, Ptolemy's arranged marriage to Eurydice, Artashir's polygamous marriage with Amina and Rania, and Alexander's marriage to Roxane, as well as a number of other commitments, including Alexander and Hephaistion, Ptolemy and Thais, and Lydias and Bagoas. Which relationships do you think work the best? Which ones were you most surprised by? Which ones do you think are the happiest and why?
   
8. One of Lydias’ greatest strengths is his cultural flexibility, his ability to understand and work with people from different backgrounds. Do you think his own background, as the child of two cultures, Greek and Carian, is the cause of this? What insights do his experiences give him?
   
9. In
   Hand of Isis
   we see the mature city of Alexandria, which is only just beginning in
   Stealing Fire
   . How does or does not that city live up to what its founders intended? How does it go beyond what its founders intended?
   
10. Do you think Lydias’ decision to marry Chloe at the end of the book at Ptolemy's request is a good decision or a bad one? What do you think will happen?
    

introducing

If you enjoyed
STEALING FIRE,
look out for

BLACK SHIPS

by Jo Graham

“Are you afraid of the dark?” she asked.

“No,” I said.

“Good,” she said, and smothered the fire with ashes until only a few coals glowed. It was very dark within the cave. I had never been somewhere there was not even starlight. I heard her moving in the dark, the rustling of cloth.

“Sit here,” she said, and I felt her putting a cushion at my back. I sat up upon it. It raised me so that I sat, my legs crossed, leaning almost over the brazier. She put another cushion behind me so that I might lean back against the wall.

There was more rustling, and I smelled the acrid scent of herbs crumbled over the coals. Rosemary. Laurel. And something richer, like resin, like pine carpets beneath my feet. Something heady, like smoke.

“There,” Pythia said. “Look into the fire and tell me what you see.”

My eyes itched. It was hard to keep them open. They watered. The smoke wavered. The tiny glowing lines of coals blurred. I didn't know what to say.

She was still talking, but I wasn't really hearing her. I was looking at the darkness between the glowing lines. At the blackness in the heart of the fire.

“Black ships,” I said, and I hardly knew my own voice.

“Where?” Pythia said.

“Black ships,” I said. I could see them in the darkness of the coals. “Black ships and a burning city. A great city on a headland. Some of the ships are small, not much more than one sail or a few rowers. But some of them are big. Painted black. They're coming out from land, from the burning city. But there are other ships in the way, between the black ships and the sea.”

My voice caught with the emotion of what I saw. “There are so few of them! I can see them coming, rowing hard. The one in front has seven stars on her prow,
Seven Sisters
, like the constellation. That's her name. The soldiers on the other ships have archers. They're shooting at them.”

One of the sailors was struck in the eye by an arrow. He screamed and plunged into the sea. One of the ships’ boys was hit in the leg and went down with a high, keening sound, his blood spurting across the deck.One of the small boats was rammed and capsized.

“There are people in the water. They're not sailors, not on the little boats. Children. Women.” I could see them struggling. The archers were shooting them in the water.

“One of the big ships is turning back. She's turning around.” I could see the dolphin on her prow, white and red on black.

There was a girl in the water, her slim, naked body cutting through the waves like a dolphin herself. She was almost to the big ship. Now she was there. One of the rowers shipped his oar as she reached for it, stretching her arms up the shaft. She got one foot on the top of the paddle, pulled herself half out of the water. Hands reached down to haul her aboard.

“
Seven Sisters
has come about,” I said. “She's bearing down on one of the ships of archers, and they're hauling at the oars to get out of the way.”

Seven Sisters
swung past, close enough that I could see the young man at her tiller, his sandy hair pulled back from his face with a leather thong, lips set in concentration, the wind kissing him.

“They have fire arrows,” I gasped. “The blockaders. They're lighting them.”

One fell hissing into the sea. Another dropped on the foredeck of
Dolphin
and was quickly extinguished with a bucket of water. A young man with long black hair was hauling one of the children from the fishing boat aboard.

The rest of the fishing boats were either sunk or out to sea, sails spread to catch the land breeze carrying them away.

I heard shouted words, saw the captain of
Seven Sisters
waving.

A fire arrow struck the captain of
Dolphin
full in the chest, his beard igniting. He fell away from the tiller, his face on fire and his chest exploding. The young man with black hair swung the child into the shelter of the rowers’ rail and leapt for the tiller.
Seven Sisters
swung away, her course between
Dolphin
and the nearest blockader.

Dolphin's
sail unfurled, red dolphin painted on white. It filled with the land breeze. A moment later
Seven Sisters
’ spread, black stars against white. Behind them the city burned. Ahead was only open sea.