Tag: ai

Ian Gouge, Losing Moby Dick and other stories (Coverstory Books 2017)

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38451081-losing-moby-dick-and-other-stories?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=mnuWH5KSpR&rank=2

Jack has lost his university-days copy of Moby Dick and ventures into a second-hand bookstore to seek a replacement. A new edition from Amazon simply won’t do. It must be dog-eared and finger-worn, steeped in the memories of his youth.
A remarkable assistant takes him on a magical tour of the backrooms, where he travels back in time to the day before his Melville essay was due. He hasn’t just lost a book. He’s lost something from his life. Could it be behind that door?
I liked the metaphor of the lost book symbolising something he’s lost in his life.
Writing to Gisela
Rick follows his friend Jackson to Lucca, Italy, and he falls in love. After a whirlwind few days, he goes home to the UK, but to his heartbreak, Gisela doesn’t answer his letters.
After four years, she gets in touch, and he is desperate to learn what happened. The rest of the story is his letters to her. Life goes on, and the circle of life turns. A final communication to Gisela celebrates the ‘closure’ he has found.
One shouldn’t have a character named Luca in a story set in Lucca. I found it quite artful that we never read Gisela’s letters, and yet we are given all the information we need about her side of the story.
Riding the Escalators
Mitch and Cheek are sitting in the mall, wondering how long it would take to ‘ride all the escalators’. To Mitch, escalators symbolise functionality. Or the idea of just once ‘doing something that no one else has done’. Mitch acquires a floor plan of the mall.
Suzi, the window dresser at Cinderella’s, jokes with her boss. Mr Lee has a talent for answering question that people have yet to ask. But Mr Lee has a secret.
Meeting Mitch, she hears about his plan and wants to go along with him. Mr Lee gives them a bag of supplies to take along.
He and Suzi get separated, and from that point on, the escalator marathon became magical, and Mitch has to figure out the rules of the game before he can find Suzi.
There are some misspelled words, but the writing is very good. After reading these three novellas, I look forward to reading a full novel by Gouge.

Gregory Michael Nixon, The Diomedeia  (DokNyx Publishers 2022)

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61836881-the-diomedeia?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=mMz56SFyqy&rank=1

Against a backdrop of the Mediterranean Bronze Age Collapse, the Sea Peoples prepare to invade Hittite capital Hattusa. The Great King Suppilulima II worships at the temple of the Storm God Tarhunta. His Great Queen Lieia-Hepa schemes to return Hatti to female rule and the dominance of the Goddess Arinna. Approaching the city, they encounter a band of refugees, including Diomedes, Trojan War veteran and once king of now-fallen Tiryns, who had been held prisoner. Henti, the ex-harem-girl, interprets. They learn that the royal family, priests and nobles have deserted, carrying with them the Hatti treasure. Diomedes and his warriors go in pursuit to Lawazantiya, cult city of the goddess. Suppilulima has a crazed plan, but Diomedes and Co ally with Queen Lieia-Hepa, who has her own plan. Kabi the Canaanite has a better idea.
The Diomedeia constructs a scenario that elucidates the collapse of the Hittite Empire, involving famous kings and generals we know from Homer and from history and who are listed in an appendix. Many of the stories we know from mythology, Jason and the Argonauts, the fall of Troy, etc. are told as tales by warriors to each other.
I will grab up any book set during the Bronze Age, but this one is remarkable for what I assume is historical detail. A bit too much of it crammed into the first chapter, maybe, before we get a chance to get familiar with the characters. Some of it—descriptions of statues and rock carvings we can still see today—I think we could do without. It’s hard to say that, though, because we have little evidence of the period other than those artefacts and the occasional clay letter from one king to another.
The dialogue could have been more natural by observing the ‘three beat’ rule—long utterances need to be broken up by action points, dialogue tags or responses.
The war council between Kabi, Klymenos, and Sarpedon is great. From that point the plot and inter-personal drama become quite exciting, although the pace slackens towards the end as the fates of the Hatti and Diomedes and his People of the Sea are determined. The ending is disappointing, yet promises a continuation of series.
Don’t miss the well-researched appendices. In fact, I recommend reading them first.
This review was originally written for Reedsy Discovery.

Colleen McCullough, The First Man in Rome (Avon 1991)

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/480570.The_First_Man_in_Rome?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=LcqcJow4HP&rank=1

Gaius Julius Caesar, grandfather of the future emperor, and his sons have joined the procession of Marcus Minucius Rufus’ inauguration to consul; his wife Marcia and their teen daughters Julia and Julilla join the crowd of spectators. Somewhere in the crowd is Gaius Marius. He runs into Caesar, who invites him to dinner. Despite humble origins, Gaius Marius was born to lead soldiers; Caesar sees it and offers him one of his daughters to wed.
Next door to Caesar’s house is Sulla’s stepmother Clitumna. Lucius Cornelius Sulla sleeps with both his stepmother and his mistress Nicopolis, but he prefers boys, like Metrobius.
Jugurtha, usurper to the throne of Numidia is on the outskirts waiting for permission to cross the pomerium. Close friends with Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus, they were all twenty-three.
Julilla has a crush on Sulla, and weaves for him a grass crown—a symbol of military victory. Nicopolis dies, leaving him a fortune. At 50, Gaius Marius finally has enough money to run for consul and leaves Africa in a mad dash for Rome. Wedded now to Julilla, things look up for Sulla, too.
There is a crisis in the Roman army—too many have died. Marius builds a new army of recruits from among the proletarian Head Count, offering booty land as payment.
The Germans in their 100s of 1000s are on the march, but Roman generals Gnaeus Mallius Maximus and Quintus Servilius Caepio are busy fighting each other, leading to the worst defeat in Roman history. Enter Gaius Marius’ African legions, sent to save the day for the Empire.
This is Book One of the colossal Masters of Rome series.
These people we know from history come gorgeously to life; the intricacies of Roman class politics are portrayed vividly. Marius’ military campaigns in Numidia and Gaul are not just discussions of armour and battles, but also feature debates over strategy, inter-personal politics and even espionage.
Told through the strong Voices of Gaius Marius, Sulla, Julia, Jugurtha. I can’t decide which I loved more, the juicy historical accuracy or the wonderful story-telling. 2000 years ago, but the characters and their letters and conversations are as natural as those of you and your neighbours. The only trouble is there’s a lot of complicated names to learn, but that’s Roman history’s fault not McCullough’s. She helps by making the characters colourful and memorable. I wish I knew how she sniffed out all the intricate inter-personal scandals behind every dollop of historical fact. If purely invented, it is totally believable.

Colleen McCullough, The Grass Crown (Avon 1992)

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3424.The_Grass_Crown?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=kWftwdXP4c&rank=1

This Book Two of the Masters of Rome series follows the political and personal lives of the famous men and women of ancient Rome.
Gaius Marius, Lucius Cornelius Sulla and Publius Rutilius Rufus dine together. Marius announces his intention to go on pilgrimage to Pessinus, but his friends know he wants to check out what’s going on in Cappadocia.
Quintus Caecilius Metellus (Piggle-wiggle) is out for blood, and Marius’ man Manius Aquillius is on trial. Sulla is about to leave for Spain on campaign. Marius takes his family to Patrae, then Athens, then Helicarnassus and in the spring, on to Pessinus. Young Gaius Julius Caesar is a precocious lad, and Aurelia hires a pedagogue. The rivalry between Sulla and Piggle-wiggle escalates.
In Sinope, King Mithridates of Pontus reads a letter—Gaius Marius wants to meet. Mithridates travels incognito. He is out for conquest.
Marius and family make it to Bithynia, where he becomes involved in politics with Mithridates and Nicomedia.
Marcus Livius Drusus dreams of ‘a general enfranchisement for the whole of Italy’; Quintus Poppaedius Silo, an Italian, dreams of Italian ‘secession from Rome’.
Drusus is determined to get his law passed emancipating the Italians. Their spokesperson thwarted and murdered, leaders of 14 Italian peoples decide to use threat of war. The early victories in the Social War go to the Italians, giving Rome a fright. Though Rome eventually wins, the Italians win their citizenship.
The story follows the lives of Young Caesar and Young Marius. Young Caesar attends upon Marius after his second stroke. Caesar pulls Marius back into politics, and Marius begins to train him. Young Marius kills Lucius Cato the Consul in a mutiny, which saves a battle. Sulla is awarded by his men a Grass Crown. Sulla massacres Aeclanum.
Despite his infirmity, Rome wants Marius at the helm against Mithridates, and Sulla is told to hand over his legions. Instead, he invades Rome. But the troops rebel. On the run from Sulla, Marius flees and takes shelter at Cercina.
At the ludi Romanii, Lucius Cornelius Cinna makes his move to introduce laws regarding the distribution of new citizens and for the recall of 19 fugitives—including Gaius Marius. The controversy leads to the Massacre of Octavius’s Day.
The story finishes with the tale of the battle between Cinna and Gnaeus Octavius Ruso and the deadly rivalry between Marius’s faction and Sulla’s.
The scope of this novel, encompassing the gamut of Roman history, both political and personal, during the 1st century BCE, means learning a lot of complicated Roman names, more so than Book One, which was mostly Marius and Sulla. It takes you through the Senate meetings, the patricians’ dinners, the war strategy and the battlefields as if you were there yourself.