After graduating in Veterinary Medicine, Miguel Ángel Nievas (Zaragoza, 1962) has developed his professional career in different and varied fields, such as, among others, computing and energy. But he always maintained his passion for literature and creation. He was able to give it a foothold in his debut a couple of years ago with ‘El copista de Carthago’ (Rialp, 2022), a work with which he managed to carve out a niche for himself in the competitive world of historical novels that has countless readers. And even more so, if possible, in the one set in the Roman Empire, an area widely traveled by the authors of the genre. In his first foray, Miguel Ángel Nievas overcame the challenge and in ‘The Copist of Carthago’ offers us a good story starring Crassus, a boy who is arrested for committing a small theft of fish and will be sold as a slave. Developed in the time of Emperor Constantine, it will go through numerous vicissitudes and will convert to Christianity, managing to survive the fierce persecution of Emperor Diocletian against anyone who professed this faith. NOVEL ‘Blue Birds in Rome’ Author Miguel Ángel Nievas Editorial Question Year 2024 Pages 300 Price 19 euros 4In ‘Blue Birds in Rome’ he continues in the field of historical novels and gives new account of his good work as a narrator. Now, it immerses us in two cities at the time of Late Antiquity. On the one hand, the Rome of an empire in decline, and, on the other, a culturally bustling Alexandria with its famous library, but politically unstable. The protagonist of ‘Blue Birds in Rome’ is Paulo, son of Sekani, in charge of a papyrus workshop in Alexandria. Paulo, a first-person narrating voice, is destined to follow the family tradition, but he is not satisfied with this and fights to develop his artistic vocation. He managed to become a famous painter in Rome, in great demand and with a personal brand: «Now the patricians offer me a fortune to fill their ‘domus’ and their villas with little blue birds. […] We have even begun to talk about the little bird and me in the gatherings where we talk about literature and art, which now proliferate in this decadent city. In some chapters, in italics, the narrating voice changes and Claudia, a Roman widow who, like Paulo, is not willing to follow the conventional path that they want to impose on her, takes the floor: «A widow like me, and even more so being a widow of a magistrate “He should limit himself to knitting wool, organizing the household routine and waiting for news from his legionnaire son.” At a certain moment, the paths of Paulo and Claudia will cross in a plot conveniently woven with a certain aftertaste of a learning novel: «Am I not that Paulo? Surely yes, just as I am this renowned painter in Rome, the same one who refused to follow the path that had already been marked and paved by my father.[…] I rebelled against that when I unloaded as a slave, I carried beads in the ‘cauponas’, when I piled up bricks. Every step I have taken has been my decision. Although he does not deny his father: “I am still the proud son of Sekani, but it was not true that making papyrus is the only thing we know how to do.”
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