A Murder in Macedon: A Mystery of Alexander the Great (Mystery of Alexander the Great)

Rating:
Summary: Intriguing mystery with historical setting
Review: Historical mysteries are all the rage now, and so we come to the murder of a king in Ancient Greece, replete with conspiracy, intrigue, and witchcraft. Such novels are harder to write than regular detective novels: in addition to the mystery needing to be good, the historical aspects need to be good also. Here the author succeeds reasonably well, and the result is a good book, worth reading if you're interested in Greek history or mysteries.

I had only a sketchy knowledge of the murder of Philip of Macedon prior to this book, but what I saw in the book was good. The king is killed during a public ceremony by one of his own guards, who is about to escape, but killed by the guards under circumstances that make it look as if he was never intended to escape at all. There's also another assassin who's been killed, further confusing things.

The detective protagonist is the most interesting character in the book, a Jewish woman whose brother is a scribe for the king himself. Once the king is dead, Alexander (soon to be the Great) asks the woman and her brother to look into the murder, and what she finds is fun and intriguing. There's a spurned wife who indulges in witchcraft, and [unintellegent] son who seems harmless but is looking for a suspicious knife, a crafty old general who's scheming for power, a pair of brothers who are pretenders to the throne, etc. All of these are suspects, and Miriam, must sort through them and figure out who might or might not have done it.

Miriam and her brother are interesting characters, and the solution is believable, if a bit far-fetched. I would recommend the book, and will be looking for the sequel.

Rating:
Summary: Short, but not sweet
Review: I am a real fan of Ancient Greece in fiction....and looked forward to reading this novel with a great deal of interest.

But while the premise is an excellent one...some ideas should be left as just that, ideas, or at least they should be presented to more capable hands.

Apart from the numerous historical inaccuracies...the references to the authors of this time read like name dropping...the story centers on the efforts of a Jewish maiden, Miriam, to uncover the identity of Phillip of Macedon's murderer, not on Alexander, and the entire story suffers from stilted conversations, contrived circumstances, and a lack of time spent researching the actual daily lives of these people.

The characters are mere caricatures of the actual persons involved in the story, and even the 'invented' characters suffer from a serious lack of development and 'fleshing out'. The revelation of a character's involvement in the murder at the end is anti-climactic, as the character was never really given much importance in the story.

The author's note at the end attempts to justify the contents with claims that there is historical evidence to support most of the action, and the speculations made are at least partly grounded in fact. That part I can accept...but while the story centers on a murder...the greatest crime of the novel is the novel itself. It suffers greatly from lack of actual time spent researching the time period, and only the few facts and suppositions gleaned by the author prior to writing it that appear in the novel in no way qualify it as good historical fiction.

Nice try, Anna Apostolou, but many have done it better.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting topic, questionable characterizations
Review: This book deals with one of the great mysteries in history - who killed Philip II, father of Alexander the Great. My biggest complaint with this novel is the author's note. The author states that Alexander's character is very much as found in the historical documents; "rather shy, self-effacing, suffering from panic attacks, and very shy of women." Not quite. Every ancient source portrays him as gregarious, prone to excessive ego and ambition, incredibly bold and often reckless. There is no indication he was shy around women, rather that he was somewhat disinterested in them sexually until his mid-20's. Alexander had conquered the known world by his 30th birthday, and one has to question the author's opinion of his character.

For those who wish to make up their minds for themselves about Alexander's character, I recommend A.B. Bosworth's excellent, "Conquest and Empire, the Reign of Alexander the Great," available, of course, from Amazon.com.