Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Yesterday I finished Pride of Carthage by David Anthony Durham.

This book is basically the story of the second Punic war, where Hannibal picked a fight with Rome, crossed the Alps, terrorized the countryside for a decade and a half and then had to run home to defend Carthage when Rome got smart.  He only lost one battle, but it was the final one.

The book does a good job of creating believable characters out of Hannibal's family and entourage, the Romans who are trying to beat him and a few miscellaneous common people thrown in for colour.  It doesn't do as good a job of making the characters feel like historical people, rather than modern people in a historical drama.