FATE is the third volume in Ian Crouch’s A Pyrrhic Victory series, which began with The Shaping of Destiny and continued with Destiny Unfolds. This volume ends the engrossing story of a great military and political leader whose life and work deserve more credit than they generally get. King Pyrrhus, as portrayed here, is a brave and honorable leader who is deeply invested in keeping the Greek world from being overrun by the warring empires of Rome and Carthage. As this volume starts, he has won the “pyrrhic victory” to which he gave his name (a costly victory over the Romans at Asculum). However, he is unable to convince the Roman Senate to agree to a peace treaty under which Rome would continue to expand in the north of Italy—leaving Pyrrhus and his allies in South Italy and Greece free to take on the Carthaginians. With Rome unwilling to make peace, Pyrrhus seeks to build a power base by taking up an offer from Sicily to drive out the Carthaginians and rule that island.
This is definitely a book for the true history buff. Pyrrhus fought and reigned at a key historical moment, and the contrast between Pyrrhus’s ambitions and the actual historical results invites the reader to speculate about what might have happened had things turned out just a bit differently. The book is well-researched and full of lovely little background details that make the reader feel immersed in the scene, from casual discussions of political philosophy over dinner to wrestling bouts that end in jokes to moments of dramatic awe (like the first sight of the great statue of Zeus at Olympia).
Sometimes, however, the story gets bogged down in those details, losing sight of the dramatic intensity of crucial and catastrophic events. It doesn’t help that the story is told in a relatively even and narratively calm voice throughout, and that characters frequently seem as if they were making speeches rather than having conversations. For example, here is Pyrrhus’s idea of postcoital pillow talk with a gorgeous priestess of Aphrodite: “Thank you, my dear. I would be grateful for your advice. Please listen to a few of my ideas, then rest your head on my shoulder. I will ask you for your thoughts in the morning.” Even at the most painful moments, emotions feel narrated rather than experienced—short-lived at best. Pyrrhus is “wild with grief” at a deep personal loss, yet a couple of pages later we read that “[t]he day had brought great sadness, but the conversation became more cheerful when they spoke about the planned athletic games.” This leaves the tragic moments of the story, especially the dramatic finale, feeling almost anti-climactic.
Still, for the reader interested in a key turning point in history and an underrated hero, FATE offers an engrossing read.
The third entry in Ian Crouch’s thorough and well-researched A Pyrrhic Victory series, FATE offers an interesting perspective on the potential of the crucial years just before the Punic Wars, but it feels more like an historical account than an emotionally engaging story.
~Catherine Langrehr for IndieReader