Customer Reviews

The Forgotten Legion (Forgotten Legion Chronicles 1)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

A debut author gives a welcome and impressive addition to the range of novels set in Roman times. UK reviews have mad mention of both Simon Scarrow and C Iggulden, but in my humble opinion this is much near the style of Iggulden. The Scarrow novels tend to have more of a focus on the action and, to me, are a Roman version of Cornwall's Sharpe novels. Of course this does have action but a lot of effort has been put into the historical and political side to balance the character development and backstory.
This sets things up by introducing the characters and then eventually bringing them together as they battle together in far away lands.
The author knows his stuff and that comes over in every page. The first in a series, I suspect the next one will be even better as Mr Kane becomes more comfortable with the characters and has less need for backstories.
This is an increasingly crowded market but quality is always welcome.

Forgotten Legion could be a pretty good book. It has some things going for it, an intriguing premise and smooth writing. It has fatal flaws in other areas that prevent me from slogging through the whole thing.

1) It has a lefty view of history in which the world is divided up into two groups: exploiters and victims. You see, one day the Gauls were out traipsing through the woods, picking flowers, as was their wont. The only downside to this idyllic existence was that they often had to spend too much time away from their wives and babies. Then one day the evil Romans came along and burned their village... The same for the Etruscans, poor fellows, another group of traipsing flower-pickers done in by the nasty Romans. Kane goes so far as to attempt to paint the Carthaginians as victims too. Yes, the poor Carthaginians, happily tending their empire, which they called Happy Valley, when one day...

Yes, we get it. American Indians, Etruscans, Gauls, Neanderthal Man...the list of history's victims is endless. Then, (dim lights, cue ominous music): Romans, Americans, pre-socialist British, Cro-Magnons...history's heavies. Enough already. We get it. How tiresome!

2) From the "what hath Steven Pressfield wrought?" department. Gritty realism in the form of, mainly, modern profanity. Lots of it. Personally, I read historical fiction to be transported to another time, the more exotic the better. I enjoy a good hero now and then, larger than life characters. Kane's minions are all in the gutter. Kane's Roman world is no more exotic than the worst parts of a modern every-city. Spell broken. Personal taste on my part.

3) Bloat, the most damaging. I realize that publishing houses no longer use editors. But it seems writers are incapable of editing their own works. This book is probably 30% too long. It's the first of a trilogy and it shows. Consider these scintillating passages (from Chapter 15. I could have thrown my dart anywhere and found other examples.):

Chapter starts off with gladiators waking up. (Every chapter should start with characters waking up, right? Start at the beginning, I say.) Then, get this, they eat breakfast. Let's join the action...

"Brennus covered a piece of bread in honey. "Want some?" he asked, shoving it into his mouth.
(You'll never believe the response, dear reader. Wait for it...Wait for it...)
"No."

On the next page, this riveting gem:
"Be careful." Astoria seemed worried as she kissed the blond warrior. "Stay together."
"Stop fussing woman!" Brennus gently squeezed her backside. "Cook me more of those mice."

Still awake? Next page, we get this high drama:
Sextus hefted the double-headed axe with a wink. "[I'll] Keep an eye out for you." (The author routinely lops off the beginnings of sentences in dialogue, intending to make it sound natural, but it usually only obscures the meaning.)
"Thank you."
"You would do the same for me."
"I would."

Go to any point in the book and you'll find this. Start at chapter 1.

Kane should learn to listen to his inner voice, because it's telling him to move things along. Again, from chapter 15, thrown in amidst the above lines of dialogue are these passages.

"The sooner we get to the arena, the better." (Couldn't agree more. How about skipping the whole waking up/eating scene?)
"It should be interesting today." (Yes, and hopefully soon!)
"Suddenly Romulus felt keen to get to the arena." (Me, too, pal...Me, too...)

These are 4 pages that should have been cut out entirely. But I shouldn't just pick on this book because there are plenty of culprits. The first 29 pages of River God should be cut by 20 pages, for example. There is a sentence in Ford's "Fall of Rome" that is 96 words long. Personally, I've had it with books that require me to edit them while I read. No more flipping ahead pages trying to find the story. A trilogy? Forget it. Do writers really think we readers have nothing better to do with our time than edit their bloated books?

It's hard to believe that this book is Ben kane's first novel. This young author writes with maturity and style that pulls the reader into the time period with characterization that all of us can relate to.

If you enjoy Steven Pressfield, Jack Whyte and Conn Iggulden you will love this book. Like Iggulden's Emperor series, "The Forgotten Legion" takes place during the rise and fall of Julius Caesar. Unlike Igguldens books though, Kane describes the times from the perspective of three slaves: brother and sister (twins) Romulus and Fabiola, and the captured Gaul Warrior Brennus. In addition, Tarquinius an Etruscan master of war and divination adds a sense of destiny and magic to this historical piece of fiction. Romulus and Fabiola are sold respectively to a famous gladiatorial school and famous house of prostitution. Kane pulls no punches in his description of gladiatorial combat, war, filth and the ultimately dehumanized state that was the lot of slaves.

The three males meet up after Romulus and Brennus escape from the Ludus Magnus. These men that have every reason to loath Rome ironically end up fighting for her under incompetent military leader Crassus and surviving a bloody battle with the Parthians only to find themselves in chains again. Fabiola becomes the favorite prostitute of a key political figure and there is even the hint that the twins hold a genetic secret that could add a real twist to this series.

While the action and storytelling are great and the historical perspective fascinating; the best thing about this new series is that it is addictively entertaining. Rumor has it that the next novel in Ben kane's series comes out in July of this year. I for one will be first in line for my copy.

The topic of this book immediately interested me---Romans, Etruscans, gladiators, and battles! The book was very well researched and I definitely learned a thing or two. However, the writing "magic" just didn't seem to be there. The story seemed more like a recitation than a novel and lacked emotional connection with the reader. I wanted to like it, but it seemed like the "storyteller" part of the author was underdeveloped. The ending left me hanging. There is apparently a second book out already or due to be out within a few weeks. Normally, I would run out and get the next one, but I have absolutely no interest in reading it at all.

I really admire anyone who can write a novel so I don't want to be totally negative. In addition to the thorough research and knowledge of the topic, he also included a great glossary that I think will come in handy.

I have been heavy into fiction set in ancient Rome for the last year or so and this book is the best I've read yet. I am really looking forward to the next 2 installments in the trilogy and I hope there are more to come after that. I noticed a couple of reviews saying that the the writer leans to the left or something along those lines. This is a novel, not a letter to the editer. Not once did I get the impression that the author was trying to use this story to push some agenda. Quite simply, if you're into ancient rome and enjoy reading good stories that keep you wanting more, you'll probably like this book....alot. As far as the few historical inaccuracies, you try writing a 500 page novel without making a mistake or two. Besides, this is not a script for a discovery channel documentary, it's a story of FICTION. Some of you people scrutinize these things way too much. Just get the book and enjoy.

I found the opening of this book intriguing. It promised a quasi-historical jaunt into a speculative Roman-manned outpost in China of all places. And who wouldn't be enticed by a story line about the mysterious Etruscans? With 510 pages in print, I figured Mr. Kane would have no difficulty pulling that whole story together.

Unfortunately, with an investment in of about 320 pages, I realized that this was just another bloated series pilot. Other reviewers' comments express those problems in details that I find to be fair. What I don't understand is the business logic. If Mr. Kane wrote a trilogy of three books, each around 250 pages, he would make three sales to me. But I am not getting onboard to slog through two more (minimum?) 500 page tomes to see how this all turns out. Wouldn't it be easier to write a 300 page book anyway? With the excess time this would leave him, he could be more than halfway through book 2, and not have exhausted hopeful readers such as myself, either.

As far as anachronism, UNLIKE OTHER COMPLAINTS, I don't find this to be a modern left/right polemic. Instead, I think the characters all anachronistically demonstrate an enlightenment-era sense of individuality and world-view. I happen to share their world view, and I am anything but a leftist -- I am a traditionalist in the Western Civilization sense of John Locke, et al. I have no problem with themes of Freedom and Liberty.

However, for so many different characters to be be so often "enraged" to a debilitating degree by the institutions of war, plunder and slavery, Mr. Kane might have had more believable characters if he told us he had sent them back to Rome in a time machine. Characters can develop insights contrary to the norms around them -- fleeting glances of the ideas of later ages -- but the four protagonists here are all full-fledged individualists bewildered by the age in which they live.

Interesting -- the Etruscans. Since Mr. Kane has researched and clearly mused a great deal on the Estruscans, I would encourage him to write speculative fiction about that society from its origins to its destruction. I would suggest he keep the books shorter, and have each be a stand alone, complete story, all at different places, times, and about different individuals, touching on the rise, migrations, mystery, and fall of a great civilization as he best imagines it.

I hope he gives that idea some thought.

The Forgotten Legion is a wonderfully entertaining book that will appeal to all readers. It just happens to fall within my favorite book interests; historical fiction, roman background, part of a series. I've read many authors with similar subject matter; Ben Kane is at the top of the list. I've been consumed with all 3 books. I'll be depressed after completing the last one later today. Buy the series for it's entertainment value. It's a great read. The historical fiction is a bonus. I'd read anything written by this author.

Dennis, Nor Cal Bay Area

Republican Rome's underbelly exposed.

Ben Kane's novel 'The Lost Legion' is a gripping novel set in ancient Rome. Kane writes about the last days of the Roman Republic but with an unusual approach. He chooses his main characters from people on the margins of Roman society, those who inhabit the underbelly of the Republic and provide the essential services to keep the wealthy in a life of luxury. This means that the society they describe is almost as much of a mystery to them as it to the reader of two thousand years later.

Kane opens the book by giving us Tarquinius, a character from the long-conquered Etruscan society, moves swiftly to introduce Brennus a giant of a Gaul and then to Romulus and Fabiola, slave siblings who are sold into two of the most awful worlds of Rome, the brothel and the circus.

Kane chooses to develop different streams of his novel, never an easy task but one which he manages with skill. I never felt I had to go back to re-read what was happening to one of the characters even when there had been a gap since I had last read about them.

I particularly liked his portrayal of the clever, beautiful Fabiola. Many epic historical novels tend to side-line female characters but Fabiola is not a woman content to be side-lined by anybody, (including, I suspect, the author.) I look forward to seeing how she will develop.

Kane seems to me to be historically accurate, adept at capturing the essence of Romans such as Caesar, Crassus and Brutus. This dedication to authenticity led to one of my few niggles. He uses the accurate Roman words for weapons, almost all of the time. This gave me pause; I'd rather he dispensed with the Latin and said swords and shields for ease of reading. Because of his accuracy I was also somewhat surprised to hear Romulus described as a teenager and wondered whether Alexander's soldiers would have been as fair of skin and hair as Kane suggests.

These tiny niggles apart, I loved this book. I have bought the next one in the series and look forward to branching out to his book about Hannibal.

Martin Lake
The Lost King: Resistance
Wasteland (The Lost King)

I am a historical fiction junkie. I love it and can't get enough of it. I spied this book at my college bookstore on a break between classes just two weeks ago, and decided "what the heck" based on the summary. Bought it, and I frankly had a hard time putting it down. Is the author wordy, as some reviewers allege? Yes, but I've read FAR worse. It is tolerable, at least in my opinion. Is it a bit "biased" towards the lower rungs of Roman society? Of course - and that is what drew me in and kept me captivated. The main characters are well developed and intriguing, the story is not dull or ridiculous but actually interesting, and it is well written. I wasn't expecting the ending to come so soon, and was disappointed I didn't have the other books to read immediately! This is a truly wonderful piece of fiction, and a refreshing work amongst Roman-oriented fiction that focus far too much on the "higher" rungs of Roman society and completely ignores the lower classes. I eagerly look forward to picking up the next two books in this series, which I will certainly do soon. This book is not for everyone, as evidenced simply by the reviews here, but I thoroughly enjoyed it, and was not expecting how well-written it was or how much it drew me in.

This book one of a three part trilogy of ancient Rome falls in the best book class for my readings in 2010 (over 200). It is a great look into life in ancient Rome in the 50BC to 40BC time period. The characters are likeable, typical, and are well defined. Make sure that when you buy this book to buy the Sliver Eagle sequel at the same time so that you can watch the story unfold. Can't wait until the third book in the series comes out in 2011.