CALIGULA

 Author: Allan Massie
 Publisher: Sceptre
 Fiction

In his book Caligula, renowned Roman history buff, Allan Massie, rebuilds the time in Rome preceding and surviving the four year reign (A.D. 37-41) of the "mad emperor" Gaius Caligula – the emperor who married his own sister and made his horse a consul.

The story begins in Caligula's childhood, during the reign of Tiberius, and is recounted by narrator Lucius, right-hand man to Caligula's father Germanicus and ultimately also to Caligula. A vine of conspiracy and treachery winds through the pages as Massie describes in detail the events building up to Caligula's reign. His time at the throne is a mix of madness and ambition, dreams and nightmares, deceit and betrayal and is laced with heavy doses of debauchery, incest, murder and fornication. His ultimate demise at the hands of two Senators comes as no surprise, and story ends with his successor Claudius - "the fool of the family" - taking the throne.

Well, this is certainly not the written equivalent of Bob Guccione's 1979 classic film Caligula, starring Malcolm McDowell as the perverted and insane emperor. Gaius Caligula is portrayed in a far more sympathetic and well-rounded fashion in Massie's fictional account of his reign. The work is very readable, being written as a candid and revealing narrative. It is packed with outrageous escapades of sexual taboo, grand violence, conspiracy, philosophical outings, humorous excesses and a wide range of interesting historical characters.

Massie has compiled an enormous cache of historical facts and has successfully turned it into a highly enjoyable story, creating a world and a character that is at once three-dimensional and believable, entertaining and thought-provoking. Events are described in colourful detail, and the period is vividly depicted.

This book is part of Massie's Imperial Sequence which also includes Augustus, Tiberius, Caesar, Antony, and Nero's Heirs.

R e v i e w e r	Des Warde