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Lion: Book 1 of The Golden Age: 'Brings war in the ancient world to vivid, gritty and bloody life' ANTHONY RICHES

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The book opens to a map of the region, as well as a pronunciation guide – which I usually love. Who doesn’t love a book with a map? The battles of the past are still fresh in the memories of the current, this helps to fuel the need for a fleet and to have people with experience around those in control. There are politics that come into play, but this is not a main part of the story. Ancient Greece without its politics just wouldn't be right! The author brings the characters to life with decisions, friendships, battles and pretty much from the point of Pericles who will have a larger role in history. The Lion is a historically based fictional story about Pericles the leader of Athens during the height of the Peloponnesian war and one of the most intriguing figures of antiquity. Pericles is a young man and isn't allowed a responsibility as he is deemed too young until he is 30 years old. But, his friendship with Cimon grants him access to meetings. The two form a formidable friendship and when needed they will support each other. Surprisingly i found the chapters in Athens to be the least compelling as most of the time was focused on Pericles helping his friend with his play and dealing with his marriage to Thetis instead of exploring the politics and daily life of Athens.

Empire - Penguin Books UK

I was so pleased when I started reading Lion as I realised straight away I was going to enjoy it. It’s been a long time since I read anything set in Ancient Greece, so a lot was new to me, including the characters as well as the historical setting. This is the first book in Conn Iggulden’s Golden Age series set in the 5th century BCE. I thoroughly enjoyed it which surprised me as generally speaking I’m not keen on reading battle scenes and the book starts and ends with battles. But I had no problem with following the action of the battles between the Greeks and the Persians, and was able to visualise what was going on without any difficulty. The characters’ names took me a little while to get clear in my mind but I soon got used to them.The sights, sounds and smells of Athens bring history to life with gripping brilliance Daily Mirror

Lion by Conn Iggulden | Goodreads Lion by Conn Iggulden | Goodreads

The battles are set far from home this time. While this is by no means a ‘light’ story, it’s also not as dark as the previous two. Not witnessing the heartbreak of seeing your home, your city, fall to invaders knowing it’s going to be impossible to keep them out, changes the tone. The Athenians are taking the fight to them, and it changes the mood. There’s an undercurrent of hope and determination, rather than the helplessness prevalent beforehand. This central character of this novel is Pericles, the younger but only remaining son of Xanthippus, the hero of the two novels of the Athenian series. Our 3rd person point-of-view comes from his perspective . While this is termed as the 1st of two books in a new series called The Golden Age, it also serves as a de facto 3rd book of the Athenian series as it continues on in the timeframe and the characters presented there. The master historical storyteller. This swords-and-sandals epic brings the ancient world to life' DAILY EXPRESSI liked it because it is nicely written in a style that only Conn Iggulden can employ. So, for some, especially if you are not passionate about history, Greek wars, battle description etc., you might find it a bit boring and long. To me, it sets the scene for what is coming, and it helps the main character (Pericles) grow for an in-depth re-creation of who this man was and what he did to remain a hero in Greek history. I am conscious that the above paragraph reads like faint praise. The truth is that, despite its readability, I have problems with the plot and characterisation. First, the clear and obvious hero of the book is Cimon, who steals every scene in which he appears. Pericles pales into insignificance in his presence. The story flags when Cimon is not present. Second, Pericles himself comes over as shallow and impetuous, nothing like how I might envisage the historical figure. True, he is young and inexperienced, but Cimon although not much older is a successful leader of men. Then there are the cardboard cut-out villains, Attikos (fictional) and Ephialtes (historical). Finally there is the entirely implausible love affair and marriage of Pericles to the unsuitable Thetis, the captive concubine of a pirate from Scyros. I just cannot conceive that this could possibly have occurred in the Athens of the aristocratic Pericles. For one thing, as soon as a woman was dragged roughly out by her hair, I could just tell she was going to be the love interest. She was such a weak character that I can't even remember her name, although that might be because she didn't appear in the entire second half of the book. A gripping read from the master historical storyteller. This swords-and-sandals epic brings the clash of empires between Greece and Persia to life' DAILY EXPRESS Interestingly, though, the narrative is told mostly from the point of view of Pericles, the future leader, as he begins to emerge into maturity. We watch him struggle to balance the competing claims of the war at sea, his new -and by no means submissive - wife, his family, and his friends, including the playwright Aeschylus and the philosophers, Zeno and Anaxagoras.

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