***** Between fantasy and history
As
a lover of historical novels set in ancient Egypt I couldn’t resist the
temptation to read this book by an Italian author who in this genre stands
beside famous authors like Jacq and just like the latter mixes effectively real
history with the fantasy shade brought by the ancient Egyptian religion and
magic.
Like
any novel trying to include most of the life of a person, this is affected by
its episodic structure. Various events are narrated; each one ends and leaves
room to another one happened in the subsequent period. For this reason after
the protagonists successfully face a challenge, you can easily leave the book
for a while. But the narration is so good that you end up getting back to it as
easily.
The
events narrated go from the arrival of Archimedes to Alexandria until his
“disappearance” many years later in Syracuse, for which the author offers a
very interesting explanation.
The
core of the plot, as can be deduced from the title, is his love story with the
priestess Cleoth. With delicacy and sensitivity Bertoni writes about this
feeling and the events caused by it, embellished with fantasy elements that
contribute to give this book a halo of mystery in which everything is really
possible.
Beside
this is history, the real one, and the tales of the amazing inventions by
Archimedes, a genius of his time, which wisely enrich the novel without loading
it with information and never creating drops of tension.
In
a nutshell, a good book which is worth much more than its ridiculously low
price.
Cleoth and Arkh on Amazon.
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