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A Mystery
by Gary Corby
"Corby has not only made Greek history accessible - he's made it first-rate entertainment." - Kelli Stanley, award-winning author of Nox Dormienda and City of Dragons
Athens, 460 B.C. Life's tough for Nicolaos, the only investigating agent in ancient Athens. His girlfriend's left him and his boss wants to fire him. But when an Athenian official is murdered, the brilliant statesman Pericles has no choice but to put Nico on the job. The case takes Nico, in the company of a beautiful slave girl, to the land of Ionia within the Persian Empire. The Persians will execute him on the spot if they think he's a spy. Beyond that, there are only a few minor problems: He's being chased by brigands who are only waiting for the right price before they kill him.
Somehow he has to placate his girlfriend, who is very angry about that slave girl. He must meet Themistocles, the military genius who saved Greece during the Persian Wars, and then defected to the hated enemy. And to solve the crime, Nico must uncover a secret that could not only destroy Athens, but will force him to choose between love, and ambition, and his own life.
"Starred Review. Despite the high stakes involved, Corby is able to integrate humor appropriately into the action. His lead... manages to retain his integrity, despite being buffeted by powerful forces and morally challenging situations." - Publishers Weekly
"The mix of real history with a crime romp makes Corby's sequel go down easily. The author deftly concocts a Mel Brooks type of history. Highly recommended for those looking for humor with their crime detecting." - Library Journal
This information about The Ionia Sanction was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Gary Corby was born in 1963, and is an Australian author of historical mysteries set in the world of Classical Greece.
Long been fascinated by ancient history, finding it more exciting and bizarre than any modern thriller, Corby combines the ancient world with his love of whodunits to create an historical mystery series set in classical Greece. His novels feature historical men and women from the time as recurring characters, notably Socrates, Pericles, and the priestess Diotima of Mantinea.
Gary lives in Sydney, Australia, with his wife and two daughters. He blogs at A Dead Man Fell from the Sky, on all things ancient, Athenian, and mysterious.
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