Customer Reviews

Double Daggers

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I found Double Daggers a very entertaining read. The author did an excellent job of helping me visualize the places that the four main characters inhabited. I enjoy reading historical fiction books by authors such as Harry Turtledove and Double Daggers was just as good as his books! The descriptions in Double Daggers are wonderfully worded so that it actaully makes you feel as if you were there. While reading you find that you actually ask yourself if this part is true or is this part the fiction, becasue the two are so innertwined you really dont know. I highly recommend Double Daggers to all fans of historical fiction or to anyone who wants to read a good story.

This book was a great read. I love books that connect different times with a single theme. The characters and setting were so vivid they played like a movie in my head as I read it. If you like history, mystery, action and have even a passing interest in coins, you'll love this book.

History, Suspense, Currency, Ego, Power... I great read that transports the reader across time. A great escape. Thanks James Clifford

This book is fantastic. Once I started reading, I couldn't put it down. The author crafted a brilliant mystery loaded with suspense all topped with a twist of history and madness. Romans, Crusaders, Nazis, Wall Street, and an ancient cursed coin. You won't be disappointed.

A well written story from start to finish. Excellent historical facts blended with the author's unique style of writing. A fluid story line that leaves a lasting impression. Looking forward Clifford's next book.

James knows how to tell a story. I enjoyed reading Blackbeard's Gift but James takes Double Daggers to the next level. My wife and I are looking forward to his next book.

Blackbeard's Gift

I heartily recommend Double Daggers to any one who enjoys a beautifully crafted, unique plot. It's obvious Clifford has done considerable research to authentically reproduce the four time periods the novel covers, particularly the scenes dealing with Julius Caesar's assassination and funeral. The realistic dialogue and descriptions are especially effective in bringing the story to life. Although the novel deals with four parallel stories, Clifford completely avoided making the characters seem repetitious. All in all this is an exceptional story that will keep the reader engaged to the last page and beyond.

If you still haven't used that book store gift certificate that you got for Christmas and want to read something edge-of-your-seat-engaging, historically fascinating, and really well written - cash it in for Double Daggers, by James R. Clifford. It's worth every penny, or should I say, denarium.

Double Daggers is a collection of four stories, which span the centuries, connected by a famously cursed coin, the Eidibus Martiis. Minted by Marcus Brutus, the Eidibus Martiis or the Eids of March commemorates the March 15, 44BC date on which Julius Caesar was murdered. The coin shows a depiction of Marcus Brutus on one side with the inscription IMP BRVT (Imperator Brutus) and on the reverse side are two daggers, which was the weapon used by Caesar's assassins. Between the daggers is the Liberty Cap with the date of Caesar's death, EID MAR. This depiction is said to signify that no individual is greater than the Republic.

The first story in Double Daggers is the story of Brutus and the murder of Julius Caesar. Clifford describes an ambitious Brutus who is riddled by his own righteous politics and also by Caesar`s last words. Did he save the Republic out of his own lust for power? And was Caesar his father? It is an interesting view of Rome, in all of its glory, from Brutus's vantage point. Clifford makes you feel as though you are standing at the edge of the forest with Brutus as he falls upon his own dagger, the very one he used to kill Caesar.

The second story is set in the time of the Crusades. It follows the journey of two very different brothers as they make their way from England to Constantinople. This story is full of wonderful descriptions of pilgrims, travelers, traders, the Byzantines, Crusaders, and the city of Constantinople in the year 1096 AD. The main character, Michael, is the un-favored son and a promiscuous drunk. Upon entering Constantinople he befriends the younger brother of Emperor Alexius, Prince Nicephorus. After abandoning his own brother and the Crusades, Michael unwittingly becomes involved in a plot to over through the Emperor. Again, Clifford's writing wraps the reader up in this exciting plot.

The third story is that of a Nazi Colonel and close friend of Hitler's during the French Occupation. The story outlines the history of the Aryan Nation and the ambitious agenda of The Third Reich and Hitler`s Order. All of the stories in Double Daggers are stories of violence but this is the least glamorized in the collection and the most disturbing. We are with Hitler in the bunker at the end of the war and Clifford's description of what becomes of his fictitious Maxwell Von Studt is disconcerting.

The final story is a modern one, set on Wall Street. Clifford begins this story with the Gordon Gekko quote, "greed is good." The character Jack Weston seems somehow less culpable then the previous owners of the Eidibus Martiis, but is he? All of the characters in Double Daggers are ambitious alcoholics, who bear an uncanny physical resemblance to Marcus Brutus. They are all underdogs who struggle to place themselves in the world of the privileged. Their success gives them vanity and confidence. They are, in a way, champions of The American Dream. It is hard to hate them completely because they remind us that the things we covet most in life are cursed by desire.

This book is so wonderful because it is a retelling of the same story over and over reminding us that we all hold an Eidibus Martiis at some point during our own lives. Double Dagger's Epilogue is especially well done, it puts all of the characters together in a forest where they merge together in a reckoning of all pasts. This book would make wonderful book club fodder, it is well written and intriguing to end.

Reviewed by Cherie Fisher for Reader Views (10/06)

James R. Clifford has struck gold, or should I say silver denarius, with "Double Daggers," a fast paced historical fiction. This book has it all - drama, intrigue and historical facts. The story is based around the EID MAR or Eids of March silver denarius that was ordered in 44 B.C. by Marcus Brutus after he delivered the final deathblow in the assassination of Julius Caesar.

The Senate murdered Julius Caesar because he was seen as a power hungry tyrant who had designs on becoming Emperor and doing away with the Republic. Marcus Brutus, the son of Caesar's mistress Servilia, had the coin minted to "commemorate the fall of a tyrant and the liberation of the Roman Republic. Romans, thousands of years from now, will sing praise to our heroics when they hold this coin in their hand". The coin had double daggers on one side and the likeness of Brutus on the other. The first coin was inscribed with the number 1 and delivered to Brutus.

It turns out Brutus severely underestimated the power of Marc Antony to turn public praise for Caesar's murder into outrage. Brutus flees Rome to eastern Italy where he finds sympathy for his cause. He builds a new army and goes to battle with Rome. When all is lost for him he kills himself with the same knife he used on Julius Caesar. Upon finding his dead body, Marc Antony placed this curse on him "Live by the sword, die by the sword. You are truly a cursed man. The evil one does cannot be undone. Not even in death." Then he throws the EID MAR coin into the river.

Flash forward to France in 1096 A.D., the time of the Crusades. Michael Claudien, son of a wealthy landowner has become an unwilling crusader. He and his brother Godfrey leave home to travel to Constantinople to join other Crusaders in the fight for Christianity in the Holy Land. They stop in Belgrade on the way where Michael acquires the EID MAR coin in a game of Bones. He does not believe that it is cursed and misfortune soon follows him.

The story then takes you to Paris, France in June of 1940. The Nazi Party has recently occupied the city of Paris. Colonel Maxwell Von Studt, a close confidante to Adolph Hitler, is living the life he has always dreamed of. Except for one thing, he has an obsession with Rome and the EID MAR coin. Von Studt has learned that it is at the Louvre, and he steals it. Things quickly go downhill for him and the Nazi Party and he soon follows the fate of his predecessors.

The final tale takes place in modern day New York City. Completely self-obsessed and arrogant, Wall Street trader Jack Weston is living on top of the world. He thinks he has everything until he sees the EID MAR coin at an auction and impulsively buys it. That is where everything begins to go wrong for him....

Even the epilogue is unexpected in "Double Daggers" when the author ties all the owners of the EID MAR coin together in a very surprising way. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book and hope to see more from this very talented author. I would recommend it to history and adventure buffs.

Received book free of charge.

Double Daggers is a fascinating story revolving around the infamous Eids of March coin--the very first coin Brutus had minted after his assassination of Julius Caesar.

The novel spans the ages, from 44 BC to the modern times, and offers the reader an intriguing glimpse into the lives of four different men--Marcus Brutus, a knight during the crusades, a lieutenant working for Hitler, and a Wall Street trader--as they become into contact with the "cursed" coin and their lives mysteriously take a turn for the worse.

Clifford's language flows beautifully, engaging the reader until the end. The characters, with their sinister motivations, are well drawn, and the well-researched historical background adds color and credibility to the story. With each lead character, a distinct, vivid world is presented. Combining history with a touch of the paranormal, Double Daggers is an original, well-crafted--and dare I say strange--story that will be enjoyed by all. Strongly recommended.

*This review originally appeared in Armchair Interviews