Warrior of Rome: Fire in the East

There are many people who are experts on a subject but who cannot turn the knowledge into a readable novel also there are many good writers whose efforts at research are presented in a manner that irritates rather than informs and spoils an otherwise good story. In Dr Harry Sidebottom we are fortunate to have someone who is not only an expert but also a vastly entertaining storyteller. In his first novel Fire in the East he tells the story of Dernhelm, son of Isongrim, Warleader of the Angles who is sent as a hostage to the Court of Rome. At the age of sixteen he is forced into a plot to assassinate the Emporer Maximinus Thrax at the seige of Aquilea. It is he who kills the Emporer by stabbing him in the throat with a stylus. After this the ghost of Maximinus appears to him at moments of stress. Years spent in a successful military career see Balista, as he has come to be known, a member of the Equestrian Order, a Knight of Rome and married to the daughter of a Senatorial familly. In AD255 he is commissioned by the joint Emporers Valerian and Galienus to travel to the province of Syria and organise the defence of the city of Arete, threatened by the forces of the Persian Sassenid King. He is given the title of Dux Ripae, Commander of all Roman forces on the banks of the rivers Euphretes and Tigris and all the lands in between but nothing in the way of manpower. He is promised that the Emporer Valerian will raise a Field Army and come to his aid the following year. On the way to his new command he has to fight a sea battle against pirates and when he arrives he finds his Roman born subordinates less than happy to take orders from a barbarian and the allies who were supposed to provide reinforcements refuse to comply. To add to his troubles there is a traitor in the camp. To tell more would be to spoil a wonderful story for the reader. Finishing this excellent novel could leave one downcast were it not for the fact that we are promised more to come.