Olympiad by Tom Holt  (3)
|
Making Money (Discworld) by Terry Pratchett  (83)
£3.86
|
Join Amazon Prime and get unlimited Free One-Day Delivery. Already a member? Sign in.
|
|||||||||
Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought
Product details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Thomas Holt provides us, in A Song for Nero, with one of the more ingeniously unlikely what-ifs of the modern historical novel: what if the body rebel troops found and dishonoured was not that of the deposed emperor Nero, but that of his official double, Callistus? A decade later, he and Callistus's mouthy younger brother Galen are still wandering the provinces of the empire, living hand to mouth and scam to scam--in some ways, a more inventive punishment for a tyrant than any court could imagine.
Thomas Holt provides us, in A Song for Nero, with one of the more ingeniously unlikely what-ifs of the modern historical novel: what if the body rebel troops found and dishonoured was not that of the deposed emperor Nero, but that of his official double, Callistus? A decade later, he and Callistus's mouthy younger brother Galen are still wandering the provinces of the empire, living hand to mouth and scam to scam--in some ways, a more inventive punishment for a tyrant than any court could imagine.
Holt's Nero is a fascinating set of contradictions, a fairly likable man in recovery from the total corruption of absolute power and keen to deny his worst crimes, or at least play them down. The petty crook Galen is the ideal foil for him, someone who cannot quite believe that his companion once did those things. And then their problems start. Not everybody thinks Nero is really dead, and there are all sorts of people with a use for him.
Like Holt's other historical novels, this one combines some of the inventive wit of his fantasies with real knowledge of the Classical period and a dark sense of irony; its principal weakness--some very routine thriller plotting--does not diminish the effectiveness of this distinctive tone of voice. --Roz Kaveney
NEW YORK TIMES
‘Witty, ironic … and achieves a deeply felt authenticity’
See all Product Description
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
First Sentence
So there we were in the condemned cell in Damascus - which is in Syria, and believe me, you don't want to go there, it's scalpingly hot and the people are not friendly - waiting for the soldiers to come back and take us off to be crucified. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
So there we were in the condemned cell in Damascus - which is in Syria, and believe me, you don't want to go there, it's scalpingly hot and the people are not friendly - waiting for the soldiers to come back and take us off to be crucified. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
|
(
