SCIPIO AFRICANUS

The author of Hannibal presents his follow-up epic on the life and battles of Publius Cornelius Scipio, the general and politician who defeated Hannibal and created the foundations of the Roman Empire. IP.

This is the second novel in Leckie's proposed trilogy about ancient Carthage, after the highly praised Hannibal (Regnery, 1996). Here the focus is on ancient Rome's greatest general, Scipio Africanus, the man who defeated one of the world's legendary military leaders. The story is told in Scipio's own words, near the end of his life, as he is dictating his memoirs to his secretary, Bostar, who once, unbeknownst to Scipio, served as geographer to Hannibal. The narrative is interspersed with bits of Bostar's own story, and this often adds a poignant counterpoint to the story of the great general. Scipio seems to be a rather stiff character in many ways, ever conscious of his duty as a scion of one of Rome's most important military families and unable to give in to his true desires, forcing himself to become the man and hero his father has trained him to be. Leckie writes vivid battle scenes and makes Scipio and Bostar believably humanAand flawedAcharacters. Readers of historical fiction will find much to enjoy here. Recommended for large fiction collections.ADean James, Murder by the Book, Houston
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The vividly re-created battle scenes and painstaking attention to historical detail that characterized Leckie's critically acclaimed novel Hannibal, are also hallmarks of the second installment in his epic trilogy on the Punic Wars and the political, economic, and military rivalry between Carthage and Rome. Credited with being the general who outmaneuvered and eventually defeated Hannibal, Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus won decisive victories against the Carthaginians at Zama, the Seleucids at Magnesia, and the Macedonian's at Cynoscephalae. Back in Rome, Scipio was publicly accused by his bitter enemy, Cato, of pilfering enemy treasure, accepting bribes, granting clemency to enemies of the republic, promoting Hellenism in Rome, and "setting himself above the will of the Senate and the people of Rome." Dictating his memoirs to Bostar, his devoted servant and companion, Scipio stoically awaits the verdict of his peers, knowing that a condemnation from the Senate requires a penalty of death by strangulation. Sweeping in scope, this outstanding fictional biography parallels the fortunes of a military genius with the rise of the Roman empire. Margaret Flanagan