Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
What all historical fantasies should aspire to, 20 Jul 2004
Having read many other David Gemmell books and a fair few other 'classical era' historical books, I can confidently say that this absolutely combines the best of both worlds, and in many ways beats the historical stories at their own game. The story focuses on the character of Alexander the Great's general Parmenion, who comes from a poor, but noble, family in Sparta where he is the victim of racist abuse and attacks for his foreign mother, to becoming Philip of Macedon's number one general and helping to lay the groundwork for one of the greatest empires of the aincient world.
Unlike the sequel (Dark Prince), Lion of Macedon largely refrains from involving many classical fantasy elements (magic, monsters, etc.) and focuses more on the historical side, which may not please fans of high fantasy, but makes the story that much more captivating. The fantasy element largely manifests itself in fortune-telling and predictions of fate, which don't really play a part in the story until Dark Prince.
Instead, the story is concerned with Parmenion helping Philip's small kingdom - poor, weak and surrounded by powerful enemies - to first survive, and then dominate the rest of Greece in the fascinatingly unstable and war-ravaged world of aincient Greece. Not to mention getting his revenge on the Spartan bigots who bullyed him when he was a child.
Although it isn't Gemmell's best book (everyone has a different favourite, but I would place Bloodstone and Winter Warriors highest), it's certainly up there with his very best, and that makes it one of the best of the best in the genre, and well worth reading if you're a fan of any kind of historical or fantasy fiction.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gemmel's Roaring Success!, 26 Jan 1999
By A Customer
This novel is quite probably David Gemmell's finest work to date. The tale itself centres around Parmenion: Lion of Macedon, from 389 - 356BC. As with most (if not all) of Gemmell's books, Lion of Macedon has three winning ingredients: a compelling plot, strong characterisation and pace. In the case of the latter, Lion of Macedon is rich in detail, yet, unlike many of his peers Gemmell does not overface the reader with irrelevancies. This means that the novel's pace never flags - holding readers' interest from the first page to the last. As well as this, the narrative is rich and evocative in a not too dissimilar fashion to Bernard Cornwell and Ross Leckie. This provides the book with believability, which is absolutely essential. As you may have guessed I really liked this novel, and as such would have no hesitation in recommending Lion of Macedon to anyone who has or has not sampled Gemmell's other works. It should also be mentioned that Lion of Macedon has a superb (if not quite so good) sequel entitled Dark Prince.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Absolutely outstanding and Historically correct., 16 April 2000
By A Customer
Gemmell's expertise in fantasy fiction writing shines through yet again. I first read this book in H/B whilst it was still on the shelf at Smiths. I could not afford it at the time and it was too long to wait for a P/B edition. He has mastered yet another era in Ancient History and tailor made it to his own imagination. Full of Heroic fantasy good V evil scenario, epic battle discriptives and a wealth of characters. Some so deep it was hard not to feel for them when they expired. I have read all of DG's books and have as yet never encountered a poorly written novel. I have only discovered one other book by DG better than this one, it was Morningstar, also written By David Gemmell.
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