Customer Reviews

Pompeii: A Novel

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It is August of 79 A.D. in the Bay of Naples and the Aqua Augusta, the aqueduct carrying water to the cities of the area, begins to dry up. Fish are mysteriously dying in their ponds. There are ground tremors and rock falls in the cities surrounding Mount Vesuvius. Some residents attribute these things to giants or to the wrath of the gods. But Marcus Attilius Primus, the aquarius, or water engineer of the Aqua Augusta, who is sent to Misenum to research and repair the problem, knows that there is a scientific explanation. As he tracks the aqueduct from its terminus in Misenum to Pompeii and then onward to the vicinity of Mount Vesuvius, he observes unusual natural phenomena, discovers the upheaval that disrupted the water flow, and realizes that an inevitable cataclysmic event is about to occur.

In this painstakingly researched story, Robert Harris has produced much more than a historical thriller. Although we know the story will end with the eruption of Mount Vesuvius and the destruction of the surrounding cities, Harris has built suspense by describing the mysterious disappearance of the former aquarius Exomnius and the attempts of the officials of Pompeii to prevent Attilius from discovering the truth. This book also provides fascinating detail on the culture of ancient Rome, from the feasts in the sumptuous villas to the ingenious plumbing in the bath houses. It provides details on the aqueduct system, a marvel of Roman engineering. Each chapter is prefaced with an excerpt from a treatise on volcanos that describes the causes of, and events occuring during, an eruption. The reader is entertained while learning all this, and is not overburdened with facts and figures.

The characters are well developed and fascinating. The brilliant writer, naturalist, and scholar Pliny the Elder, and the pompous and wealthy city developer Ampliatus come to life through Harris' talent. From slaves to powerful land barons, from laborers to statesmen, the reader is treated to all facets of the citizenry of ancient Pompeii. There is also a weakly developed love interest between Attilius and the daughter of Ampliatus. This is the one part of the story that would have been better if left out. Even with that flaw, the book is compelling reading with a built-in ancient history lesson.

Pompeii by Robert Harris has received some excellent reviews, and it was on the strength of these that I decided to read the book. I was not disappointed. Mr. Harris does have the gift of giving his reading the feel of a place and time. He breathes life into the late first century and presents the many facts and customs in a way that sparks interest and not boredom. The novel begins on August 22, 79 CE, and the chapters are cleverly organized following the Roman hours of the day and also give the actual hour when the events are taking place. Each chapter is prefaced with an excerpt from a technical work on volcanology that provides the reader with an idea of the activity going on inside Mount Vesuvius.

The story revolves around the Aqua Augusta, an aqueduct that the protagonist of the story, Marcus Attilius Primus, first becomes the aquarius (the person responsible for maintaining the structure) of the aqueduct and then searches for a break that prevents the flow of water to the drought stricken countryside. Atillius is a noble character, an imperial official who takes pride in his work and is incorruptible. But he is now in the self-proclaimed city-on-the-make: Pompeii.

Along the way we meet Ampliatus, a wealthy freedman who is, ironically, marrying his daughter to Popilius, his old master. Ampliatus represents a long line of uncouth and ambitious freedmen that came to dominate the principate in the early empire under Claudius and Nero. Mr. Harris paints a probing and revealing portrait of Ampliatus and draws an inevitable comparison with Trimalchio of Petronius' Satyricon, with the freedman presiding over a similar overly sumptuous banquet Ampliatus. As a classicist, I found the banquet scene a little too reminiscent of the novel by Petronius. The characterization was a little too close and I did not want a parody of that famous literary banquet scene. However, I think Mr. Harris more than makes up for identifying his character so closely with Petronius by giving him a darker and more ruthless side.

Ampliatus' daughter Corelia is the conscience that her father does not have. She is a teenager of marriageable age and chafes under the ruthless nature of her father and her own helplessness before her own loveless marriage. The novel presents an interesting portrait of Pliny the Elder that I found captured his interest in the world around him and his battle of filling his days with as much activity as possible. We also have the embittered Corax; the overseer of the men who maintain the aqueduct, an enemy of Attilius, who is ready to do anything to get rid of the "new man in town."

A central part of the story is the mysterious disappearance of Atillius' predecessor Exomnius. Is he alive or dead? Little by little Attilius pieces together Exomnius' background and his association with Ampliatus, a revelation that places his life in jeopardy. In the background is Vesuvius. We know the catastrophe that is about to happen and look on as the trembling of the earth raises the curiosity of Pliny and the rumblings of the volcano remind people of thunder and giants.

Pompeii is a well-conceived novel that presents a plausible story populated with flesh-and-blood characters. It is a fast-paced book that is a joy to read; a book that is hard to put down, and a must read for people interested in ancient history or who find the city of Pompeii a fascinating place.

Everybody thinks they know about the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius at Pompeii--79 AD . . .rivers of bubbling magma . . .citizens immortalized in pleading poses for all eternity by ash . . .the heedless rich getting their comeuppance from nature. Those basics are true, but Robert Harris reminds us that the eruption of Vesuvius was much more than that. It remains one of history's greatest and most dramatic disaster stories, and we know a great deal about it because one of the Roman Empire's greatest historians was there to write a blow-by-blow record of the destruction; and although Pliny did not survive, his report did.

Pompeii and Herculaneum were the Malibu and Santa Barbara of Rome. In the hot August of 79 AD, tourists were swarming to the cool coast to enjoy the luxury accommodations, crystal swimming pools, and elegant spas of the bayside resorts. Marcus Attilius is there too, but he's not there to enjoy the occasional cool breeze, he's there to work as the new aquarius of the Aqua Augusta--the new water engineer in charge of the enormous aqueduct that brings endless water flowing to the nine towns around the Bay of Naples. Springs are failing for the first time in centuries and the flow of water is being disrupted to hundreds of thousands of people. Attilius' family has worked on the great aqueducts for generations, but even he is bewildered by the cause of this crisis somewhere along the Aqua Augusta's sixty-mile line--a line that stretches along the slopes of Mt. Vesuvius.

The Roman aqueducts were an amazing feat, and Harris describes their workings in great detail. He does an excellent job of showing, not telling, and through Attilius and his crew he weaves an incredible amount of information into the narrative and it is fascinating. Also excellently done is his description of the various effects of the eruption--which lasted several days--where he uses Pliny's observation of the event of excellent effect. Pliny, historian and general, was also a very fat and cranky old man by 79 AD. He took one of his ships out into the bay to watch and record the devastation from what he thought was a safe distance. But too soon the ships in the bay were in danger from the roiling waves and huge chunks of pumice flying down off the mountain. Pliny had his scribes don helmets and take down his descriptions as clods of pumice bounced off the old general's uncovered head--"The pumice is less like rock than airy fragments of a frozen cloud." he dictates. "It floats on the surface of the sea like lumps of ice. Extraordinary!" Eventually it would clog the bay and begin to crush ships. Pliny knew he was too heavy and unsteady to escape the final firestorm from Vesuvius and ordered his scribes to save themselves and his precious reportage. Fortunately they did, and Robert Harris puts Pliny's observation to fine use in this novel.

Harris is a workmanlike writer with the gift of being able to integrate complicated information into a believable narrative. That's what made "Enigma" and "Fatherland" so interesting, and what works for "Pompeii." The characters are take second place to the setting, and are not particularly exciting. However, they respond to the extraordinary circumstances around them in ways that are completely consistent with their characterizations. It is the same with Harris' establishment of place. He offers no special explanations of Rome, but builds it all into the action. As a result the Roman world seems very immediate and almost modern.

Harris, author of the acclaimed thriller's Fatherland and Archangel, has a hard task here: He must eke out suspense in a tale to which the final outcome will be known by every reader. Pompeii could well fall flat on its face, but instead it is a remarkable triumph. It straddled the bestseller lists in the UK for about 4 weeks, and should garner a similar reaction across the pond.

Its high summer along the Bay of Naples. The merchants are trading, the tourists are visiting, and the rich are lounging in their villas by the ocean. But all is not well...Recently installed Chief Engineer of the Aqua Augustus Maximus Atillius Primus senses trouble; springs have been failing for the first time in years, his predecessor remains missing, and fish have been dying in their pools. Everything indicates a problem with the aqueduct, a disruption somewhere on the sixty-mile mainline, on the Northern slopes of the great mountain Vesuvius. Then, one by one, the towns around the bay begin to loose their water supply...

One might think that because the reader automatically knows the outcome of the book (a horrendous eruption) it might be a little dull, but that is not true at all. Harris skirts the pitfalls presented by this potential lack of suspense by creating some great characters whose fates the reader cares about. Will they perish? Will they somehow escape? He also manages to weave in some excellent themes, most notably the slight shadowy parallels he draws between Rome, the superpower of the time, and modern-day America, and the subtle message that even a great power is irredeemably vulnerable when confronted by great unexpected destruction from within. In a way, he is warning us about complacency, but, more importantly, he is displaying how all the power in the world can not ensure our safety or complete peace-of-mind in this modern day-world, exactly as it could not then. It's rather clever how the book seems to reach across the years.

The historical detail is amazing, and the atmosphere - at first relaxed, then later full of fear - is built expertly. He makes everything so interesting. Certainly, I never would have believed I could enjoy reading about the workings of an ancient aqueduct! (Actually, there might be a little too much detail on the engineering ins-and-outs.) The pace is good, and the book is, often inexplicably - the beginning, the scene-setting, threatens to grow dull once or twice - a complete page-turner. It moves softly, until the final 100 pages, which are absolutely brilliant. Possibly the best final 100 pages I've read this year. Suddenly, the book explodes along with Vesuvius. The pace cracks like a whip and suddenly everything's full of electricity and terror as everyone flees and rushes about confused. Everything progresses in tense bursts and then aching graduality, with painfully slow descriptions of people trying to wade through thick ash, for example. It is a very effective juxtaposition.

Pompeii has everything: it is impeccably written, is crammed full of subtle historical information, it has death, destruction, undercurrents, mystery (the previous engineer went missing, remember) and even a little romance! As a thriller, I would recommend it highly. As an enjoyable education, I would recommend it unreservedly.

"Pompeii" was my first foray into historical fiction and it was quite interesting.

It took me a few chapters to get used to the idea that the event (the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius on 24th August 79 CE) was true, but the characters were not. I also had to catch myself a few times while reading this because I started asking, "This really happened?" If an author is able to do that, then he/she has done their job of drawing you into their world.

The book starts off with an explanation of the superior Roman system of telling time and their ancient names for the days of the week and months. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the modern era's names for the above are close to those of that time. It never fails to amaze me that we have access to detailed information about everyday things that were around close to 2,000 years ago - and it's accurate! Unfortunately, it took a catastrophic eruption to preserve ancient history (I've read quite a few times that the ash made the city into a life-sized time capsule with the way it settled).

Harris did a great job of documenting the buildup to the eruption through the aquarius Marcus Attilius, his fictional telling of the corruption of the ultra-rich of Pompeii (which could very well be based in fact, as I've read that numerous times in as many books), and who could forget to mention those numerous brothels?

It was a shame that so many people had to die because of the lack of knowledge of volcanoes, but when something is dormant for so long you're led to believe it's a dead volcano (and it was generations before Vesuvius came back to life, so the knowledge that it was dangerous was long gone by the time Pompeii became an important port city). So before people ridicule the Pompeiians for their lack of knowledge of Vesuvius, I would like to remind them of a little incident known as Mount St. Helens in Washington State. Even though there wasn't the loss of life near the scale of Pompeii with that eruption, there was no excuse to not know about that as 1980 is not ancient history!

This was one gem that was collecting dust on my bookshelf. I decided it was time to see what this was all about and was not disappointed in the least. I know there are other fictional accounts on the same subject, but this is a good start.

And I'm elated to have read this knowing that Roman Polanski is going to direct the (rather expensive) movie adaptation of this soon. I'm rather eager to see how he brings the timeless beauty of Pompeii to life and how he's going to interpret the eruption and the ensuing chaos for the big screen.

This was an enjoyable read. Harris's sources are excellent and his research was impeccable. - Donna Di Giacomo

An enjoyable, well written and well researched book gives an interesting insight into Roman engineering, science, business customs and daily life. Set in Pompeii, starting two days prior to the erruption is a story of love woven on a sound historical and scientific base (interestingly enough Plinius features in the story). Easy to read and enjoyable, albeit short (large print and double spaces are used to extend the number of pages to a respectable minimum for a book), a recommended read.

True historical fiction is a rare genre. Historical fantasy is very common. But the ability to truly recreate a moment in time as it might have been is rare. In his previous book, Fatherland, Harris showed his ability to create historical fantasy. Now, he is warmed-up and wants to show that he can create historical fiction. And that is exactly what he does.

In Pompeii Harris recreates the days before the eruption of 79 AD that destroyed the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. He does this by telling the story of Marcus Attilius Primus, an engineer who takes over the Aqua Augusta, the aqueduct that brings water to the area around Vesuvius, when the previous engineer disappears. As he deals with maintaining the aqueduct and learning the politics of leadership, Attilius comes face to face with the earth's--and human's--warning that will lead to the eruption and what follows.

There are many things I like about this book. First, despite the fact that we know exactly what's going to happen big picture here (Vesuvius is going to erupt), Harris is able to keep us interested and excited. Second, we get a feeling that, although we know this is fiction, this is something that could have happened. It is not pure fantasy in an historical setting. Finally, Harris has the ability to create characters that we care about.

Admittedly, Harris has chosen a subject in which I am very interested. The eruption of Vesuvius has long fascinated me and a few years ago I traveled to Italy to tour the ruins of Pompeii. It was very fun for me to read this book and get a feeling for what that time was like. This novel hit no false notes with me. If anything, I wish Harris had been willing to carry the novel past the eruption farther into the aftermath. That said, I think anyone who enjoys historical fiction will find a lot to like here.

I was excited to see this on the shelves, but somewhat disappointed in the overall story. The story focus is on the water engineer Attilius. He's been sent by Rome to Pompeii to repair a breach in the aquaduct. The mysterious disappearance of the local Aquarius, the title for the water engineer, factors into the storyline.

I love the history of Pompeii and so I wanted to love this book. Where I feel this book failed me, at least, as a reader was in trying to build up the suspense of the eruption which we know is coming, know will be devastating and result in burying two entire cities at the expense of developing the characters. There are only a few characters to follow. Attilius and Corelia, the daughter of the corrupt rich freed slave Ampliatus. It seems Ampliatus has rebuilt Pompeii from the devastating earthquake that shook the region years before. Ampliatus is the bad guy here, but the fact he was a former slave takes away the edge of him being the bad guy, at least for me. To elevate his status in society he is going to marry his daughter Corelia to his former master's son. Pliny the elder factors into the story as well.. which is fun because I love the blending of fact and fiction. Unfortunately, Corelia is thinly drawn and has too little to do in the story - we don't even have the benefit of seeing her emotional attachment to Attilius develop. This is a shame because I eventually cared more about what happened to Pliny than Corelia! That's because this takes place 3 days before the eruption. Very little time to throw Attilius and Corelia together since he's trying to repair an aquaduct in the hills. In fact Pliny has more to do than the heroine in the story. The ending was a bit blah as well... I'm not in the habit of ruining plots so I won't mention what happens, but it was a big build up and then... a sketchy epilogue, as if even the author wasn't invested enough emotionally in his characters to give them a proper resolution. Oh well. I do have to say the description of the town, how citizens and slaves went about their daily lives were all fabulous. I can't get enough of Pompeii, and it helps if you've been to the ruins to try to place yourself in the story when a town square is described, the mention of fountains etc. In short, Mr. Harris did a fabulous job of making a doomed ancient city come to life. His characters on the other hand were left out in the cold. So, overall, in my humble opinion, it was just okay.

Robert Harris is a superb writer. I couldn't put this book down. And, the descriptions of the eruption of Vesuvius and its effect on the population have you experiencing them right along with the characters! The references page in the back of the book reveal just how carefully Harris researched his subject. A great book!

A fascinating novelization of the hours before Vesuvius's eruption, Robert Harris' romantic tale of good and evil weaves threads of volcanology, lessons from history of the Roman Empire with fascinating facts of the most revered of Roman technological accomplishments; the aqueduct. A must read for those who love ancient history or historical fiction.