Amazon Book Description
- Ancient Rome teems with ambitious and ruthless men. None is more brilliant than Marcus Cicero. A rising young lawyer, backed by a shrewd wife, he decides to gamble everything on one of the most dramatic courtroom battles of all time. Win it, and he could win control of Rome itself. Lose it, and he is finished forever.
- Imperium is an epic account of the timeless struggle for power and the sudden disintegration of a society.
- Robert Harris is the author of fifteen bestselling novels: the Cicero Trilogy - Imperium, Lustrum and Dictator - Fatherland, Enigma, Archangel, Pompeii, The Ghost, The Fear Index, An Officer and a Spy, which won four prizes including the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction, Conclave, Munich, The Second Sleep, V2 and Act of Oblivion. His work has been translated into forty languages and nine of his books have been adapted for cinema and television. He lives in West Berkshire with his wife, Gill Hornby.
- Robert Harris is the author of Pompeii, Enigma, and Fatherland. He has been a television correspondent with the BBC and a newspaper columnist for the London Sunday Times and The Daily Telegraph. His novels have sold more than ten million copies and been translated into thirty languages. He lives in Berkshire, England, with his wife and four children.
- Customers say1: Customers find this historical novel to be a compelling read with a well-woven narrative based on factual events. The book features extraordinarily detailed historical research that brings ancient history to life, and customers appreciate its fascinating characters that are brought to life by the author. They praise the writing quality, with one customer noting it's written from the perspective of a devoted slave-cum-scribe, while another mentions how it keeps readers reading quickly to find out the outcome. The political content receives positive feedback, with one customer highlighting the uncanny comparisons to modern politics.
Back Cover Blurb
- When Tiro, the confidential secretary of a Roman senator, opens the door to a terrified stranger on a cold November morning, he sets in motion a chain of events which will eventually propel his master into one of the most famous courtroom dramas in history.
- The stranger is a Sicilian, a victim of the island's corrupt Roman governor, Verres. The senator is Cicero, a brilliant young lawyer and spellbinding orator, determined to attain imperium - supreme power in the state.
- This is the starting-point of Robert Harris's most accomplished novel to date. Compellingly written in Tiro's voice, it takes us inside the violent, treacherous world of Roman politics, to describe how one man - clever, compassionate, devious, vulnerable - fought to reach the top.
Amazon Customer Review
- Set in the dying days of the Roman Republic, Marcus Cicero begins his ascent through the ranks of the senate to become one of the most powerful men in Rome. But the path to becoming the famous orator we now know is strewn with dangerous men who would see a high-minded lawyer dead in a ditch to get what they want. Men like Pompey and Julius Caesar who are looking to destroy democracy for a military dictatorship and absolute power.
- Robert Harris writes another fantastic novel, his second Roman novel (after "Pompeii") and the first to feature Cicero as main character. He effortlessly creates the Roman world for the reader so that you can really see and feel what it's like to live in this time, detailing the numerous social structures and customs that are completely alien to 21st century people. He brilliantly chooses Cicero's slave Tiro to be the narrator of the story, a man who was Cicero's right hand man but also created short-hand so that it seems plausible that so much detail could be put into the book when someone who was there could conceivably have recorded it all.
- But I will say the first half of the book is the better half. The first sees Cicero take on a corrupt governor of Sicily as he builds a case against the man and the reader is introduced to the brutality of Roman law and punishment ("miles and miles of crucifixions") and the showdown in the courtroom. Despite being set in antiquity it reads like a contemporary legal thriller such as you might expect from John Grisham, and the book really takes off.
- The second half is where things become extremely complicated. There is a conspiracy to take down the Republic and create an absolute ruler, an Emperor, which we know will be Julius Caesar, and so there is endless discussions over elections, bribing voters, legal discussions of ruling, and so on that become the main focus of this second part. Throw in dozens of Roman names which make it hard to keep track of the plot, and the complications of the Roman voting system, and the momentum built up in the first half of the book completely fizzles out in the second.
- That said, "Imperium" is an incredible achievement by Harris who has crafted a well-researched, completely viable ancient thriller that is believable, informative, and well written. Intelligent and compelling to read (for the most part anyway), it is well worth a look for fans of Robert Harris but also those interested in Roman history who want to see some of history's biggest names come to life on the page. Despite its problems, I'm fully invested in Cicero's plight and will definitely pick up the sequel.
In-Page Footnotes ("Harris (Robert) - Imperium")
Footnote 1:
- This is the AI summary of Amazon customer reviews.
Book Comment
Cicero Trilogy, Vol. 1. Arrow Books, 2009. Paperback
Text Colour Conventions (see disclaimer)- Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2026
- Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)