Boudicca’s Daughter — Elodie Harper Coleman’s Notes® Reader’s Companion CN-077

Read the novel. Explore the history. Discuss it more deeply.

Elodie Harper’s Boudicca’s Daughter takes readers into the turbulent world of Roman Britain and the aftermath of Boudicca’s rebellion, imagining the life of Solina, a daughter of the Iceni queen.

Solina’s journey takes her from rebellion, loss and captivity towards an increasingly complicated relationship with the Roman world. Her story raises compelling questions about survival, revenge, identity, family, empire and what it means to build a future after your former world has been destroyed.

This comprehensive 58-page Coleman’s Notes® Reader’s Companion is designed for readers who want to explore those questions in much greater depth.

Inside your Reader’s Companion:

• Extended Plot Summary

• Detailed Reading Guide

• 28-part Episode-by-Episode Reading Guide

• In-depth Character Studies

• Themes and Motifs

• Historical Context: Boudicca and Roman Britain

• Rome under Nero and the Julio-Claudian World

• Historical Timeline

• Setting and Material World

• Language, Style and Narrative Technique

• Eight Extended Close Readings

• Critical Perspectives

• Further Book-Club Analysis

• Historical Fiction: Fact, Silence and Invention

• Twenty Book-Club Discussion Dossiers

• 50 Reading & Discussion Questions

• Reader’s Essay and Study Focus

• Ten Key Episodes

• Twenty Key Concepts

• Quick Reference

The guide pays particular attention to the fascinating relationship between history and historical fiction.

The surviving ancient sources tell us about Boudicca’s rebellion and record the assault upon her daughters, but they leave those daughters largely silent and unnamed. Harper uses that historical silence to create Solina and imagine the life that might have existed beyond the famous rebellion.

For book clubs, this creates especially rich areas for discussion:

Is survival itself a form of resistance?

When can justified rebellion become morally troubling?

Can genuine affection exist within profoundly unequal relationships?

What does a daughter owe the memory of a legendary mother?

And how far should historical fiction go when imagining the lives history failed to record?

Ideal for book clubs, reading groups and individual readers who want to understand both the novel and its historical background more deeply.

Digital PDF | 58 pages | CN-077 | £6.95

COMPLETE CONTEMPORARY COLLECTION 1

John of John — Douglas Stuart

Nesting — Roisín O’Donnell

Mrs Dickens — Emily Howes

Where Are the Kings — Donal Ryan

Boudicca’s Daughter — Elodie Harper

£6.95 each

Five separately: £34.75

Contemporary Collection 1: £29.95

SAVE £4.80

READ • REFLECT • EXPLORE • UNDERSTAND