DNF

Narrated by Steven Brand
It’s no good, I tried to like this – and some bits I did like. The character of the ranger Asher was fascinating, as were the two Greycoats he teamed up with, but the story kept sidestepping into various factions of Greycoats, elves (good and bad), students of magecraft, and royalty. I found it confusing, the story spread across too many participants and, sad to say, I didn’t really care about most of them. The narration was okay – not sparkling, but OK, though after a while it started to feel a little ponderous. I tried to stick it out and reached close to 45% of the way through, but in the end I simply wasn’t enjoying it enough to carry on, even though I wanted to find out what happened to Asher.

Audiobook narrated by Russell Boulter.

I jumped into this series at number #7, but didn’t have any problem getting into the characters despite not having any idea of what happened in books #1 - #6. It’s AD 46 and Roman centurions Cato and Macro have been posted to Judea to investigate Longinus, Roman governor of Syria, and to try to mitigate the effects of Roman oppression in a hearts and minds operation. Yeah, right! Religious figures are revolting (literally), and after Rome crucified the last charismatic Judean leader, Jehoshua, the whole place is a revolt waiting to happen, stirred up by local tribesman, Bannus. Add to that opportunistic Parthians eager to fight Rome and Macro and Cato have an almost impossible task. Macro is the seasoned centurion, happy to charge in regardless. Cato, his junior, but slightly more upper class, is a clever thinker. Together they make a good pair when the fort they’ve been assigned to is full of corruption. This is read quite well, if a little ponderous, by Russell Boulter, but he has a strange pronunciation of the letter A, as in last. He doesn’t have the short northern A, so it doesn’t rhyme with ass. Neither does he elongate the A-sound to rhyme with arse, but somehow manages to rhyme it with air, so last sounds like lairst. I can only think it a deliberate choice, but it kept pulling me out of the story at first, though by the time I reached the end I’d almost stopped noticing. The blurb says for fans of Bernard Cornwall, and I would also say for fans of Lindsey Davis’ Falco – though without the lightness of touch.