Genre: Paranormal, Shifter, Romance, Historical
LGBTQ+ Category: Gay
Reviewer: Ulysses, Paranormal Romance Guild
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About The Book
58 BCE. Titus Laelius Thrasea is a legionary in the Roman army, at war to defend Rome’s allies. Commanded to lead a reconnaissance mission with a group of “barbarian” Gauls, he is warned that they have a special magic—but he is not prepared for what this expedition will uncover.
Suddenly thrust into the wild forest with an unlikely team, Titus has to rely on Coro, their leader, who reveals the secret behind the pack—that they have the gift of shapeshifting into wolves. Unlikely allies, Coro the Gaul and Titus the Roman will have to push past their differences when they face the ultimate challenge of war, espionage, and fate. Their mutual attraction is forbidden, but will Titus be able to tame his own desire—and the wolf in front of him?
The Wolves of Gaul is a thrilling historical tale of opposites forced to fight together, work together, and in the darkest times, love one another.
The Review
I loved this book, and was startled by the great care with which the author tackled a pretty ambitious idea: set a same-sex romance in the time of Julius Caesar’s campaigns in Gaul (ancient Celtic France). It’s fascinating, and feels plausible due to the pains the author takes in establishing language and tone that both work.
Confessing that most of my knowledge of ancient Gaul comes from reading dozens of Asterix le Gaulois comic books as a teenager, I was completely caught up in Rena Butler’s efforts to create the sense of culture-clash between the somewhat humorless but brave-hearted Titus Laelius Thrasea (a Roman citizen and second-tier officer in Julius Caesar’s massive Roman army) and Coro, son of Martalos, an Aeduan Gaul whose tribe is allied with Rome.
Oh, Coro, aside from being very handsome, with long blond hair and chartreuse eyes, is also part of a pack of werewolves whom Julius Caesar himself has engaged to work as spies under Titus’s leadership.
Yeah, werewolves, which is the only paranormal thing about this story. No magic. No vampires, no demons from hell. Just a group of Gaulois who have this special gift from the Moon Goddess. It totally makes sense. I loved them and the way they tease Titus about his Roman snobbery (calling them barbarians) and ultimately bond with him as he proves his worth and his trustworthiness to them.
Even the sexual aspects of the story are treated with nuance, exploring the realities of such male/male relationships in both Rome and Gaul (especially in the context of werewolves, which I had to remind myself was not historical fact).
It’s not a long book, but a rich read. It does what a novel should: takes you out of your world and into another.
The Reviewer
Ulysses Grant Dietz grew up in Syracuse, New York, where his Leave It to Beaver life was enlivened by his fascination with vampires, from Bela Lugosi to Barnabas Collins. He studied French at Yale, and was trained to be a museum curator at the University of Delaware. A curator since 1980, Ulysses has never stopped writing fiction for the sheer pleasure of it. He created the character of Desmond Beckwith in 1988 as his personal response to Anne Rice’s landmark novels. Alyson Books released his first novel, Desmond, in 1998. Vampire in Suburbia, the sequel to Desmond, is his second novel.
Ulysses lives in suburban New Jersey with his husband of over 41 years and their two almost-grown children.
By the way, the name Ulysses was not his parents’ idea of a joke: he is a great-great grandson of Ulysses S. Grant, and his mother was the President’s last living great-grandchild. Every year on April 27 he gives a speech at Grant’s Tomb in New York City.
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