The third installment in McCullough's magnum opus (after The First Man in Rome , LJ 9/15/90, and The Grass Crown , Morrow, 1991) continues her chronicle of the decline of the Roman Republic and the impending rise of the Roman Empire. The novel's events are dominated by Sulla's return from exile and subsequent installation as Rome's first dictator in almost 200 years; Pompey the Great's machinations as the wealthy provincial, which clears his own path upward through Roman politics; and the maturing of Gaius Julius Caesar, who will ultimately set Rome upon it's imperial course. These three are ``Fortune's favorites.'' Painstakingly researched, McCullough's Roman saga is like a trip through time. Her characters come to life as do their surroundings. While giving us rollicking good fiction, McCullough has also made clear the bribery and chicanery that made up Roman politics. She has given us clear insight into how Rome found itself changing from a republic to an empire. Highly recommended.-- Steven Sussman, ``Library Journal''
The third installment in McCullough's mega-series on the fall of the Roman Empire, this hefty volume picks up where "The Grass Crown" (1991) left off. It begins in the year 83 B.C. and runs through 69 B.C., a violent and volatile era that brought the rise and bloody rule of the maniacal, disease-ridden dictator Sulla; the career of the cocky if dense "Magnus" Pompey; and the youth and education of Julius Caesar. As McCullough relates each and every historical event of import in her tireless sweep, she embellishes fact with dozens of anecdotes and quickly rendered scenes of intrigue, political maneuvering, grandstanding, gossip, sex both affectionate and calculated, and wholesale slaughter. While her wooden dialogue is almost laughable, McCullough's scope and grasp of her material, and her ambitious effort to animate and popularize it, is truly impressive. From depictions of public spectacles to whispered conspiracies, from cuddling to crucifying, McCullough works to charge history with the current of personality. We see Cicero orating, Crassus slaying, and Caesar and his mother consulting, and we meet a new and revised version of Spartacus. As she has in each of her Roman books, McCullough has provided an introduction, maps and illustrations, and an extensive glossary. To be continued, McCullough assures us, but in more finely focussed volumes. Watch for "Caesar's Women".
In her third majestic tale of Rome (83-69 B.C.), McCullough spotlights three mighty beings and the frictive sparks from their occasional interactions: Sulla, Dictator of Rome, whose early career was chronicled in The First Man in Rome (1990) and The Grass Crown (1991); the military juggernaut Pompey; and the great Julius Caesar, "the greatest prime mover of them all." Again, McCullough brings order to the mighty tangle of battles and political strategies of ancient heavyweights—in the Forum Romanum or in the tents of war. Sulla, his early beauty gone, scabrous, toothless, and given to bouts with the wineskin, takes over Rome as Dictator, issues a blizzard of new laws returning rule to the patricians (landed aristocrats), and banishes all masks and effigies of his old partner and foe, the late Gaius Marius (The First Man in Rome). Sulla will tolerate the contributions of Pompey, who insists on being called "Magnus" and has a child's temperament ("He could never be a danger to the Republic," says Caesar). Among those opposing Sulla is Young Marius (son of Gaius Marius), whose head will join others of Sulla's enemies on poles by the Senate. Working for "order and method," Sulla labors for Rome and thereby his "dignitas" ("his personal impressiveness"—the only triumph over death). His job done, Sulla makes a shocking exit and has a last laugh. Meanwhile, Julius Caesar, finally relieved of a hated role as priest, embarks on a series of extraordinary military and diplomatic coups, but quietly, correct in hierarchical obligations, stunning in charm, intelligence and beauty—and patient. Like other authors of popular Roman historical fiction, McCullough must reconcile thosecivil, gossipy, sophisticated makers and doers with acts of bizarre cruelty (the Spartacus slave revolt featured over 6,000 crucifixions along a major highway). But the author's fidelity to sources, her witty glossary, and strong narration offer some firm ground and exciting speculation. (Maps and illustrations) (Literary Guild Dual Selection for January; First printing of 100,000)
