Christian Cameron

The ultimate historical adventure novel: the life of Alexander the Great in a single, epic volume. To many he was a god. To others he was a monster.

The truth is even more extraordinary. As a boy, Alexander dreamed of matching the heroic feats of Achilles. At eighteen he led the Macedonian cavalry to a stunning victory against the Greeks.

By twenty-five he had crushed the Persians in three monumental battles and was the master of the greatest empire the world had ever seen. Men began to call him a god. But behind the legend was another, more complex story.

Narrated by his boyhood friend Ptolemy, this is the story of Alexander as you have never heard it before: raw, intimate, thrilling - a story of extraordinary daring and unimaginable endurance; of wanton destruction and murderous intrigue - the epic tragedy of a man who aimed to be more than human.

Two and a half thousand years ago, the Greeks and the Persians fought an epic battle to decide the future of the world... Arimnestos of Plataea grew up wanting to be a bronzesmith, like his father. Then, in the chaos of war, he was taken to a city in the Persian empire and sold as a slave. To win his freedom he had to show that he could fight and kill. Now, to preserve that freedom, he must kill again. For the Persians are coming. A vast army sent by King Darius to put down the rebellious Greeks and burn the city of Athens to the ground. Standing against them on the plain of Marathon is a much smaller force of Athenians, alongside their Plataean allies. To defeat such overwhelming force seems impossible. And yet to yield would mean the destruction of everything the Greeks have dreamed of. In the dust and heat of Marathon, in the clash of shields and the rush of spears, amid the thunder of hooves and the screams of the dying, those dreams will undergo their fiercest test - and Arimnestos and his Greek comrades will discover the true price of freedom.

480 BC. Arimnestos of Plataea has already lived through several lifetimes' worth of adventure, from being a rich man's slave in Ephesus to winning glory at the battle of Marathon against the might of the Persian Empire. But the gods - and the Persians - aren't finished with him yet. As an experienced sea captain - his enemies might say pirate - he has a part to play in the final epic confrontation of the Long War between the Greeks and Persians, the Battle of Salamis. It is a battle where many debts of blood will be repaid, ancient grudges settled, fame won and treachery exposed, where the Greeks must finally bury their differences and fight as one - for against them Xerxes, the Great King, has assembled the greatest fleet the world has ever known, his sworn purpose to brutally extinguish the flame of freedom and make every Greek his slave.

The heroic story of Arimnestos of Plataea continues - a thrilling historical adventure set amid the epic struggle between Greece and Persia - perfect for fans of the blockbusting film 300. Slave, pirate, husband and lover: Arimnestos of Plataea has been many things in the course of his life. But men remember him best as one of the heroes of the Battle of Marathon, the epic victory that prevented all of Greece from falling under the Persian yoke.

But now there is a new Great King on the throne, determined to succeed where his father failed. As rumours abound of a vast Persian invasion, an embassy is sent to forestall the threat. Arimnestos is chosen to escort them - an honour he can hardly refuse.

But as the storm clouds of war gather and factions on both sides begin to weave their treacherous plots, Arimnestos' journey begins to look more and more like a suicide mission.

The Roman invasion from the western seas is imminent, and from the south the Spartans are burning and pillaging their way north. Battle-hardened Philopoemen believes the Achean League is facing annihilation if it does not arm. But without a formal army or cavalry, they don't stand a chance. Convincing his friend and healer Alexanor that the threat is real, together they begin to build a massive cavalry guard from the ground up - one that will fight on all fronts. It is the last roll of the dice for the Achean League. But Alexanor knows Philopoemen is one of the greatest warriors Greece has ever known - the New Achilles. The Last Greek.

Alexanor is a man who has seen too much blood. He has left the sword behind him to become a healer in the greatest sanctuary in Greece, turning his back on war. But war has followed him to his refuge at Epidauros, and now a battle to end the freedom of Greece is all around him. The Mediterranean superpowers of Rome, Egypt and Macedon are waging their proxy wars on Hellenic soil, turning Greek farmers into slaves and mercenaries. When wounded soldier Philopoemen is carried into his temple, Alexanor believes the man's wounds are mortal but that he is not destined to die. Because he knows Philopoemen will become Greece's champion. Its last hero. The new Achilles.

When the dust settled and the blood dried after the Battle of Plataea, Greeks might have thought that their freedom was secured. But before the corpse of the Great King's general was cold, Athens and Sparta began to bicker over dividing up the spoils. After an autumn of victory, it's a long cold winter among the burned cities and destroyed shrines of Greece, and a hungry spring. And when Arimnestos goes to sea to cruise the Persian-held coasts, he finds that Persia is still not beaten... and that old alliances are now fraying. Is the impossible true? Would the Spartans rather see Athens destroyed than Persia defeated? And who will save the cities of Ionia from the Great King's wrath?It's the spring of 478BCE, and the Long War isn't over yet.

In a world at war, a brother and sister seek revenge...Another drama-drenched story in a truly epic historical series. They were born in the middle of a battle, into a world at war. And from their first moments of life, twins Satyrus and Melitta were fighting for survival.

Their father, a Greek mercenary, was cut down not long after they had taken their first breath; their Scythian mother was cruelly murdered when they were still children. But Satyrus and Melitta are children no more. They have learned how to fight, how to love, how to plot and how to kill.

Now it is time to leave their adopted home, the city of Alexandria, and the protection of Alexander the Great's former general, Ptolemy - and seek revenge. Now it is time to go to war...