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Birds of Prey: Birds of Prey
 
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Birds of Prey: Birds of Prey [Paperback]

David Drake (Author)
2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)


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Book Description

August 3, 1984
Rome, 262 A.D: It had been the capital of the greatest civilization on Earth. Now both city and civilization are dying. Imperial unity has shattered as separatist and usurpers squabble among themselves and greater enemies gather to swallow them all. One man stands between humanity and the Long Night, matching his savage determination against a hopeless future. He is Aulus Perennius, an Imperial secret agent as tough and ruthless as the age in which he lives. Until now, though, his enemies have all been human.
--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.


Editorial Reviews

Review

"A convincingly detailed sense of ancient history...the sense of historical detail is the book's greatest strength."
--Fantasy Review on Birds of Prey

"His world, his journey and his adventures are described with the avidity and single-mindedness of a history buff...Drake's feeling for the era and his dramatic flair do breathe life into the story."
--Publishers Weekly

"Blood and thunder need not be thud and blunder if done with intelligence and flair, and David Drake has proven that he can do it that way."
--Asimov’s SF Magazine

"What makes it special are vivid characters and the sense that they're moving through a real world very different from our own."
--Locus

--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

About the Author

David Drake lives in Pittsboro, North Carolina.
--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 348 pages
  • Publisher: Baen; First Edition edition (August 3, 1984)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0671559125
  • ISBN-13: 978-0671559120
  • Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.1 x 1.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
  • Average Customer Review: 2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,704,047 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

The Army took David Drake from Duke Law School and sent him on a motorized tour of Viet Nam and Cambodia with the 11th Cav, the Blackhorse. He learned new skills, saw interesting sights, and met exotic people who hadn't run fast enough to get away.

Dave returned to become Chapel Hill's Assistant Town Attorney and to try to put his life back together through fiction making sense of his Army experiences.

Dave describes war from where he saw it: the loader's hatch of a tank in Cambodia. His military experience, combined with his formal education in history and Latin, has made him one of the foremost writers of realistic action SF and fantasy. His bestselling Hammer's Slammers series is credited with creating the genre of modern Military SF. He often wishes he had a less interesting background.

Dave lives with his family in rural North Carolina.

 

Customer Reviews

9 Reviews
5 star:    (0)
4 star:
 (4)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:
 (3)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
2.7 out of 5 stars (9 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Good yarn - SciFi in Ancient Rome, July 6, 2001
A lot of our Sci-fi books look at alien invasion in the current time. What if aliens had invaded in the past and been defeated? Aulus Perennius is a roman imperial spy who is recruited by a mysterious person to help track down and destroy a small group of aliens who have landed in the Roman Empire.

Drake tells a good fast paced story within a well researched Roman Empire setting which gives the book a good authentic feel. He avoids the worst excesses of ray-gun sci-fi, while introducing comic elements such as an early christian cult who try a little too hard to worship the cruxicifiction, a displaced allosaurus who has a taste for donkeys and a nerve wracking naval battle in a hundred year old ship which is ready to fall apart.

A highly enjoyable read which won't put too much strain on the brain cells. Good fun!

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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Well Worth the Read, March 11, 2000
By A Customer
While not quite as good as his most recent works--Drake keeps improving from excellent to nearly perfect--I highly recommend this title. It was the first Drake work I read, and has kept me watching for his titles ever since. Naturally, if the combination of a Roman historical setting and a vicious alien threat are not to your liking, this is not the volume for you...
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars A Solid Example of Drake's Roman SF, February 6, 2000
I was surprised to see some low reviews of this one. It's a good, solid example of the same trademark combination of history (especially military history) and high-tech aliens as Drake's better-known Belisarius series. Theme: war is war, from the ancient past to the distant future, and the human mind is more important than the technology it faces.

Drake's been there and knows his stuff, and he writes as convincingly about swords and armor as he does about the tanks he knew in Vietnam.

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