For my BCBrum Christmas NSS partner - looks an interesting book, hope you enjoy it!

Really looking forward to reading this - a great NSSS thanks

A very bloody book about a period in Roman history I knew very little about. The lead character changes in each section in the book as the story unfolds. It covers the period when Rome was still being led by a senate accessible to certain families, and 2 consuls elected from their ranks each year. It shows how being good at politics and making the right alliances are vital to survival and success. I was particularly interested in the positive and negative influence of some of the female characters, even though they usually had little say in their marriages.
The worrying element, in the light of the elections in America today (2016) is the fact that men in power who were not quite balanced in their attitudes had very little to stop them doing what they wanted.

Leaving in the book cupboard