ePub Catilina's Riddle download

by Steven Saylor

Author:

Steven Saylor

ISBN13:

978-1854878892

ISBN:

1854878891

Language:

English

Publisher:

Constable & Robinson Ltd; 4th Edition edition (March 31, 1998)

Category:

Suspense

Subcategory:

Mystery

ePub file:

1442 kb

Fb2 file:

1905 kb

Other formats:

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Rating:

4.3

Votes:

247

Steven Saylor Mystery English

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Читать онлайн Catilina's riddle. I remember where each volume came from. Books are like friends, are they not? Steadfast, unchanging, reliable.

CATILINA'S RIDDLESteven SaylorCONTENTSMaps Part One NEMOPart Two CANDIDATUSPart Three CONUNDRUMPart Four NUNQUAMEpilogue Author's Note NOMENCLATUREThe Latin name Catilina is sometimes spelled Catiline, especially in older texts, just as the Latin Pompeius is more familiarly rendered Pompey and Marcus Antonius becomes Mark Antony. Читать онлайн Catilina's riddle.

Catilina's Riddle is a historical novel by American author Steven Saylor, first published by St. Martin's Press in 1993. It is the third book in his Roma Sub Rosa series of mystery novels set in the final decades of the Roman Republic. The main character is the Roman sleuth Gordianus the Finder. The year is 63 BC, and Cicero is consul of Rome

The Latin name Catilina is sometimes spelled Catiline, especially in older texts, just as the Latin Pompeius is more familiarly rendered Pompey and Marcus Antonius becomes Mark Antony. Scholars nowadays tend to prefer original Latin spellings, which I have followed in the case of Catilina, if only for its euphony. The stress falls on the third syllable, which has a long i. I have also used contemporary Latin names for a number of cities.

Scholars nowadays tend to prefer original Latin spellings, which I have followed in the case of Catilina, if only for its euphony.

Scholars nowadays tend to prefer original Latin spellings, which I have followed in the case of Catilina, if only for its euphony lso used contemporary Latin names for a number of cities. Some of these (with their more familiar names) include: Faesulae (Fie-sole), Arretium (Arezzo), Massilia (Marseille), and Florentia (Florence). Dates are given according to the Roman calendar before it was reformed by Julius Caesar.

Steven Saylor is the author of the long running Roma Sub Rosa series featuring Gordianus the Finder, as well as the New York Times bestselling novel, Roma and its follow-up, Empire.

Gordianus the Finder-legman and sleuth for the orator Marcus Tullius Cicero in Roman Blood (1991) and Arms of Nemesis (1992)-gets swept up in the epochal Catiline conspiracy in this ambitious crossover novel. Steven Saylor is the author of the long running Roma Sub Rosa series featuring Gordianus the Finder, as well as the New York Times bestselling novel, Roma and its follow-up, Empire. He has appeared as an on-air expert on Roman history and life on The History Channel. The United States of America (USA), commonly known as the United States or America, is a country comprising 50 states, a federal district, five major self-governing territories, and various possessions. At . million square miles, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest country by total area and is slightly smaller than the entire continent of Europe, which is . million square miles.

by Steven Saylor First published 1993. Showing 1-30 of 38. Catilina's Riddle (Roma Sub Rosa, Published February 18th 2002 by Minotaur Books. Paperback, 496 pages. Author(s): Steven Saylor.

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Catilina's Riddle is an excellent and very different historical novel.

Saylor rivals Robert Graves in his knack for making the classical world come alive. Ironic and satisfying. Catilina's Riddle is an excellent and very different historical novel. As a former history major and student of Latin who loves detective novels, I found Catilina's Riddle compelling. This novel appears to be another investigation of Gordianus the Finder but it is so much more. The real inquiry in Catilina's Riddle is psychological rather than legal.

Cordaron

This is the longest, densest, and oddest of the Roma Sub Rosa series. It contains relatively little dialog, much introspection on the nature of Roman politics and Roman virtue, detailed accounts of the processes of Roman government and legal life (voting, debate in the senate, the extremely detailed and obscure campaign laws, coming-of-age ceremonies, process and applications of augury, etc.), and Hamlet-like vaccilation over whether Gorianus, as pater familias is doing the right thing by his family and raising his son Meto properly.

What Catalina's Riddle doesn't contain, however, is a mystery. Technically, there is one: across 500 pages we have three bodies left on Gordianus' farm, clearly intended as a threat of some sort. It gets mentioned every few chapters. Gordianus doesn't do any actual "finding" (his word for what we'd call "detecting") until the last few pages of the book, after the real story is over.

The real story in the book is the Cataline Conspiracy. It's one of the most famous, fascinating, and important events in all Roman history. One can even make a clear argument that it's the no-turning-back point in the collapse of the Republic. Plus, it has some of the most wonderful muck-raking in history. Cicero's nasty hyperbole about the co-conspirators (gathering to drink blood, plotting to kill people in the night to incite revolution, killing husbands to seduce wives and extract their money, etc.) is matched only by Cicero's peacock-proud parading of himself as the only true servant of Rome.

If you want a readable account of the conspiracy (Sayler has never been a Cicero apologist, so expect a sympathetic view of Catalina's motives, if not his actions), a good account of details of Roman life (including some harsh observations on the Roman ideal of country living), some good observations on Roman morals, and a great time with the Gordianus family, it's a great book. The history lessons are a bit excessive, but never go on too long. The navel-gazing gets a bit much at times, but that has always been a trait of the character. There isn't nearly enough Bethesda, although we get a *lot* of just-of-age Meto and his trying to find his own way in the world, being unsuited to following in his father's and Eco's footsteps and his family not understanding what he truly wants to do.

If you only want the mystery, skip to the next book. It makes what happened clear enough (you really just need to know where Meto wound up and that's abundantly clear when you need to know it). But be warned, from this point on the series gets more political and introspective. The action level does pick up a lot, though.

Foginn

This is one of Steven Saylor's excellent "Gordianus the Finder" series of novels set in Republican Rome. It truly constitutes superb entertainment at several levels. Firstly, this novel is permeated with extremely insightful observations concerning the basic nature of Republican Roman society. We see Rome as a society with certain recognizable features of our own, but still shockingly different from Western culture. Slavery, a rigid class system, a thoroughly corrupt system of justice, and a dysfunctional economic system are among the chronic problems of ancient Rome. This novel explains much of this without boring the reader. To the contrary, Saylor's discussions of Roman society and government are fascinating.

Equally fascinating is the plot of this novel. The story is told in the first person by Gordianus the Finder, who is essentially a professional investigator. Here, Gordianus is asked to do certain favors for Consul of Rome Marcus Tullius Cicero. Specifically, Cicero asks Gordianus to play host to Lucius Sergius Catilina, Cicero's sworn enemy. The reasons are complex, and in this novel Gordianus finds himself becoming enmeshed against his will in violent Roman politics of the highest nature.

This novel moves at a leisurely pace, in common with most or all of the Gordianus the Finder novels. This will put off some readers, but I found myself enjoying every page of the novel. This one is an excellent read, made even better by the fact that the author has something to say. Catilina is a controversial figure in Roman political history and to this day historians argue about whether he was the rogue that Cicero made him out to be. What we see in this novel is that the ruling Roman aristocracy is smothering the middle and lower classes and political change is inevitable. Perhaps Catilina was trying, with many allies, to effect this change. As the "Afterword" in this novel points out, Catilina was the loser and the histories were written by his enemies. Likely we will never fully understand the man or his intentions.

Author Saylor's portrayal of the aristocratic Claudius family is hilarious. Saylor clearly has little use for the Roman upper classes as he believes they existed in late Republican Rome.

The gradual pace of this novel is offset by the fact that it neatly ties up most of its loose ends in a startling and entertaining fashion that most readers will appreciate. Besides being good history, this novel is also excellent storytelling.

Highly recommended. RJB.

Crazy

This sets apart from the Sub Rosa series in scope and heft. The historical moment often overtakes the mystery, and is treated with a loving fascination by the author, as the protagonist navigates a particularly thorny period, struggling with his own compass. No easy answers here. A fine mystery and a true achievement as a historical novel.

Adrierdin

First I think this book was too long. Not sure what I would cut, but it dragged in places. I read in a day, but still had trouble remembering what little things happened in the beginning. That said I enjoyed both parts of the book the story of Catalina and the mystery of headless corpses on the farm. I am reading the next now, but not sure how much further I am going to go, maybe a new time period will be a good change of pace. Overall, just really heavy tone.

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