The Man from Cannae by John Jakes

[ParthianBow]

Sheesh, where do I start with this book? I read about it on a list of historical fiction novels a few weeks ago. It was ostensibly about the Second Punic War, a subject dear to my heart, so I looked it up here. I guess the cover should have put me off, but I overrode my instincts. When it arrived, I finished it in a couple of days. I'd give it one and a half stars out of five.

I recently read an article about Jakes in which it was stated that his publishers asked him to write a Roman novel because they were popular at the time. He did so in a very short space of time. Well, it shows. His research must have consisted of a book called 'Interesting facts about the Second Punic War', but little else. So on the first page, we have a Roman cavalryman, an officer in fact, using a pilum. Howler! On the second page, there are legionaries with a gold eagle. Howler! Worse than that, the main character is a commoner who has somehow become the prefect of a cavalry wing. Laughably, he gets demoted to the legions, is repromoted to his original position, demoted again and ends up as a centurion! There are Praetorians in Rome, when at that time they only existed as guards for army commanders; cohorts as well as maniples. I could go on, but my eyes have glazed over.

I could swallow some of those howlers if it wasn't for the dire plot, and the execrable sex. Women just fall into bed with the main hero - literally within half a page of meeting him. It's all snowy breasts in the moonlight and wonderful coupling, even when the hero is badly wounded. A couple of times he's captured and threatened with death by his own side, who don't recognise his accent as being Roman but think he's either a Carthaginian or a Greek. This, when he would have been a native Latin speaker while the races mentioned would not!

That said, the writing is decent enough, and a lot of the historical facts are accurate. If it hadn't been for that, I would have given it one star or less. This book would have been better marketed by Mills & Boon. Avoid it, unless that's your interest.