Customer Reviews

The Fall of Rome: A Novel of a World Lost

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I picked up The Fall of Rome because I remembered reading Michael Curtis Ford's first novel, The Ten Thousand, some years ago and because I had read good things about it here at Amazon. I also had a vested interest in the book, because ancient and medieval history is my field and I love good historical fiction. Unfortunately, The Fall of Rome was a severe disappointment.

Contrary to what many here have asserted, The Fall of Rome is not well-researched. Even though the period during which the novel takes place is under-documented--hence the "dark ages" slur--there are numerous errors in every area from major to minor details. The barbarian king Odoacer, as the main character, is depicted as half-Hun, half-Germanic, when in reality his father and mother were both Germanic. Ford confuses the geography of Rome and the function of its major buildings--he claims that the senate meets in the Temple of Capitoline Jupiter, when it actually met in the Curia. He also seems to be under the impression that Roman armies still dressed, manuevered, and fought the same way in the 5th century AD as they had four hundred years earlier, under men like Julius Caesar and Trajan. They did not, and hadn't for centuries.

Ford has to invent a lot of what takes place in the novel, which is not a bad thing--historical novelists must fall back on invention and a good novelist will seamlessly interweave fact and fiction. Where Ford invents, though, he falls back on cliche and melodrama. Roman triumphal parades, scheming politicians--every Roman cliche except the orgy is here. Tied closely to that, all the characters, with perhaps two exceptions, are flat and uninteresting. Their dialogue is clumsy and cliched, the bad guys variously threatening in hushed tones and bellowing in rage. The sympathetic characters are just as two-dimensional, with the result that the many lengthy battle scenes are sometimes boring and tedious because the reader has invested no emotion in the characters.

The novel wasn't all bad, though. The pace picks up significantly in the last quarter or so of the story and the only two really interesting characters make appearances then--Severinus, a Christian hermit who takes Odoacer under his wing, and Pelleus, a legionary centurion whose speech before the legion perfectly captures the tone of Roman soldiers' pride in their service.

I really wanted to like The Fall of Rome, and actually tried to make myself like it. But the book on the whole was so clumsily written, paced, and plotted that I wound up only making myself finish it.

Not recommended.

While not as strong as Stephen Pressfield in "Gates of Fire", Michael Curtis Ford makes a strong contribution to the burgeoning collection of historical fiction books set in ancient times.

In this case, we follow Odoacer, a real-life German/Hun who variously fights against and fights for the Roman Empire in its last days. The fight sequences are strong and with the exception of a couple of slow spots early on, this book hums right along. If readers are unaware of Odoacer's true place in history they may want to delay researching him until they have finished the book in order to avoid spoilers.

Part of Ford's style is to narrate without necessarily telling you the year or how much time has passed. From time to time he gives dates but oftentimes you have to guess how many weeks/months/years have passed. This is annoying at best and sometimes confusing for several pages.

This book is not an overall sweeping epic that covers all aspects of the fall of Rome. There is minimal discussion of corruption, except at the very highest levels. There's no discussion of cultural aspects, financial troubles and any of the other myriad issues that caused the collapse of the Roman Empire. The book focuses almost exclusively on the military aspects of the time.

One glitch lept out at me - on page 84 Ford has the Huns using "compound bows". The compound bow was not invented until the 20th century. I am sure this was a misstroke of the keyboard, perhaps he meant a similar word such as "compact" or "composite." The only reason I mention it is to warn readers who are familiar with the true destructive power of a compound bow - the Huns would have loved them but they did not have them.

Michael Curtis Ford has surely taken to heart the old chestnut - what's the most important attribute of a historian? An iron butt. This joke is a testament to the solitary, grueling craft of history - grinding through the source material until your eyes water and your rear goes numb.

The same is true for the best historical fiction - a good entry into the genre must be solidly grounded in the period. Otherwise, the book is fantasy.

Ford has clearly done his research - while many writers of historical fiction are content to jump from battle to battle (the battles are the easy part to write), good historical fiction makes a bygone era come alive with accurate-yet-riveting depictions of a bygone era. Colleen McCullough's "Masters of Rome" series achieves this end, as do the action-packed books of Steven Pressfield and Bernard Cornwell.

This novel is ostensibly a sequel to "The Sword of Attila," Ford's excellent take on Attila and his march against Rome. "The Fall of Rome," however, struggles. This is in many ways understandable. Rome did not fall in a single cataclysmic event like Atlantis getting swallowed by the sea or Luke Skywalker blowing up the Death Star. Rome died a death by a thousand cuts. This makes the event no less interesting, but it does create problems for the writer seeking to create a sense of drama.

As a result, "Fall" takes place over several decades as the heirs to Attila (who died shortly after he failed to conquer Rome) vie for power. If Ford had written a "Shogun"-sized epic of several hundred pages, "Fall" might have worked. But instead he wrote a novel of a bare 300-odd pages. Accordingly, there are huge jumps between chapters of several years and hundreds of miles - and the novel loses all flow and cohesiveness. Also, the ostensible conflict between hero and villain suffers as the two men - Orestes (villain) and Odoacer (hero) don't interact for close to thirty years.

"Fall" reads kind of like a Cliff Notes version of the novel, highlighting key passages but leaving much of the meat off the page.

Ford is an enjoyable writer, and his research is impeccable. This novel simply smacks of biting off too much for the size of the planned novel and not being able to make it into the true epic it deserves.

This book is ok as history about ancient warfare and "barbarian tribes" goes, but anyone who is interested in the Roman empire and the fall of Rome needs to find it elsewhere. The book says almost nothing about Rome and its empire in almost the entire first half of the book. Since I am living in Rome and have become quite interested in all things Roman I bought the book because of it's title, the quality of the author and the snippets at the back cover of the book which suggest the book is about Rome's empire. Well, as I say in the title of this review, Rome is a world lost in this book. I guess the answer to the riddle of the misleading title is that a more fitting title would have meant fewer copies sold.

Curtis Ford does a good job describing the Western Roman empire in its last throes. I found the story entertaining and the characters interesting. However, he isn't as sure footed a historian as, for instance, a Colleen McCullough. I couldn't put my finger on it but often times, I had the impression that he just winged it and hoped that not too many people would notice that his research was a bit shaky. (To his credit, he does warn his readers that some of the information he needed -such as on the Scyri tribe- is scant.
Though this isn't the best historical novel I've read, I've really enjoyed it. I'll definitely read some of his other books.

I can't recommend this book enough! It's absolutely great. I also in the same order received 'The Last King'. I didn't really have the time for this ... but I got through both books in just 7 days ... missing a lot of sleep ... and not being very efficient at work :-)
Yesterday I just recieved 'The sword of Attila', 'The Ten Thousand' and 'Gods and Legions'. I can't wait to start reading ... scared a little bit about my work-situation!
Those historial novels are in the same league as Conn Iggulden's.

Michael Curtis Ford has worked variously as a labourer, a ski patrolman, a musician, a consultant, a banker, a Latin teacher, and a translator. He holds degrees in Economics and Linguistics and lives in Oregon with his wife and their three children He has written a number of novels and numerous articles on ancient military themes.

The year is 476 ad and the Roman Empire is clinging to its last vestiges of power. The Empire is riddled with corruption and is reeling from centuries of barbarian aggression. Now it faces a challenge greater than any it has had to face in its long and dramatic history.

This is a powerful novel encompassing the things that combined to bring a one great Empire to its knees. It is a powerful insight into Roman warfare in all its raw glory, so much so that the reader feels he is on the battlefield as catapult bolts fly overhead, the screams of the wounded and dying and the smell of battle. A mixture of blood, sweat, fear and voided body fluids as the sons of Attila wage battle with the last of the Roman Emperor's.

The author is a master at depicting battle scenes from early history and this book is no different. It encapsulates how an ancient battle, was fought to the bitter end, hand to hand combat, looking into the eyes of the man opposing you. Using weapons that usually maimed rather than killed your opponent cleanly. Savage and brutal, but somehow exhilarating and exciting.

The more I thought about Michael Curtis Ford's "The Fall of Rome" , the more I liked it. Certainly it is 350 pages of fantasy (coulda-happened-this-way) but it is very well researched given that so little is known about this period of history. Simplistically, I guess it could be about the first days of the dark ages or, conversely, about the final days of the corrupt Roman empire when generals vied in assassinating emperors, assuming the throne, and being assassinated in turn.

But on a deeper level, it helped me understand that the end was a very gradual unraveling. That the process of barbarians becoming Romans and moving into the upper reaches of Roman nobility was a process which could not be stopped once begun and which played out over 250 years.

Our Hero is a mixed-race Hun and German and has his own set of flaws. His enemies are also, by no stretch of the imagination, pure-blooded Romans. This would have horrified Cicero but he has by now been dead for nearly 500 years. The greatest strength of Ford is the complexity he gives to the enemies. They, too, live in staggeringly bewildering times and loyalities are ever-shifting. I loved the fact that I could not predict who would be aligned with whom as the novel unfolded. These were not cardboard charaters. They were just warriors trying to survive in a world falling apart. Good read, well written. Three thumbs up

It's been a few weeks since I read this book, but I recall that I loved it. It ran through the last few years of Rome until the empire actually falls and a new "king" is in place. I later checked out a history of ancient Rome book from the local library and found that the novel was accurate in terms of the names of characters, sequence of events, etc. The book follows the main character from when his village is destroyed by the Romans, and follows him up to the point where he is at the gates of Rome with the power to do the same to Rome. I would recommend this for all of you who love reading about ancient Rome, but want to read other than a history text.

In A.D. 453 the great Hun Attila dies drunk in his own blood on his latest wedding night. His death and Pope Leo's actions bring new hope for the Roman Empire as their vicious adversaries squabble amongst one another for control. Assassination of rivals becomes the norm giving Rome a chance to recover after the Hun brought the empire to its knees. Germanic mercenary General Orestes and his men leave camp just after Attila's death. The Hun's top advisor General Deco goes to the council, but is assassinated in front of his two adult sons, Odoacer and Onulf, who flee for their lives.

Forced to separate, Odoacer journeys to Noricum, the home of his deceased mother, where he expects sanctuary, but also learns he is the king's grandson. Odoacer takes charge of the military and defeats the Huns, but a few years later loses to the Romans. He survives by fleeing to Italy where Onulf is an officer in the Roman army. They unite preparing to avenge their father's death when they encounter his killer, a VIP in the still collapsing Roman Empire.

Though it is worth first reading the prequel, THE SWORD OF ATTILA, THE FALL OF ROME stands on its own; as the tale starts when the previous one ended with the death of Attila. The story line is action-packed as the two heroic siblings leap from one battle to another, which reflects closely the warring collapse of the Roman Empire. Although much of the key cast members outside the brothers seem one dimensional, fans of historical fiction will want to read Michael Curtis Ford's terrific thriller as Pax Roma has become bloody Roma.

Harriet Klausner