When Tiro, the confidential secretary of a Roman senator, opens the door to a terrified stranger on a cold November morning, he sets in motion a chain of events which will eventually propel his master into one of the most famous courtroom dramas in history.
The stranger is a Sicilian, a victim of the island's corrupt Roman governor, Verres. The senator is Cicero, a brilliant young lawyer and spellbinding orator, determined to attain imperium - supreme power in the state.
This is the starting-point of Robert Harris's most accomplished novel to date. Compellingly written in Tiro's voice, it takes us inside the violent, treacherous world of Roman politics, to describe how one man - clever, compassionate, devious, vulnerable - fought to reach the top.
Robert Harris is the author of fourteen bestselling novels: the Cicero Trilogy - Imperium, Lustrum and Dictator - Fatherland, Enigma, Archangel, Pompeii, The Ghost, The Fear Index, An Officer and a Spy, which won four prizes including the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction, Conclave, Munich, The Second Sleep and V2. His work has been translated into forty languages and he is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He lives in West Berkshire with his wife, Gill Hornby.
Title: Imperium
Author: Robert Harris
ISBN: 9780099406310
Binding:
Publisher: Cornerstone
Publication Date: 2007-07-05
Number of Pages: 496
Weight: 0.2586 kg
Harris's best so far, rapid and compelling in narrative, copious in detail, thoroughly researched but also, which is more important, thoroughly imagined... Irresistible -- Allan Massie * Sunday Telegraph *
In Harris's hands, the great game becomes a beautiful one * The Times *
Genres ancient and modern have rarely been so skilfully synthesised... Gripping and accomplished -- Tom Holland * The Guardian *
A joy to read in every way, and as a mirror to the politics of our present age has no equal * The Independent *
Harris deploys the devices of the thriller writer to trace the perils and triumphs of Cicero's ascent ... A finely accomplished recreation of the power struggles of more than two millenniums ago * The Observer *
