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ben_miller 's review for:
Pompeii
by Robert Harris
Volcano stories are never really about volcanoes, just like shark stories are never about sharks, and zombie stories are not about the shambling hordes, but the few that cower from them. Sadly, this volcano story IS about a volcano--or rather it is about the volcano-related research that the author did in order to write it. It's full of sentences like, "They could feel the warmth from the hypocaust, a clever Roman heating system that worked like this..." in which you can feel how Harris is dying to tell you about this cool thing from ancient times. I'm all for cool things from ancient times, but it takes a great writer of historical fiction to make the details seamless, and this one doesn't fit the bill. (Disclosure: I made up that sentence, and it's a bit of an exaggeration, but not too much.)
Story-wise, Harris devised a pretty great premise, and then proceeded to march it forward step by deliberate step, occasionally prodding at it with something sharp, until it was devoured by pumice and ash and noxious gasses in the final 50 pages.
That premise is: Something is wrong with the aqueduct that services the towns around the Bay of Naples, and tenderfoot engineer Marcus Attilius is dispatched from Rome to investigate. The previous hydro-engineer, or "aquarius," has vanished without a trace, and it is all quite mysterious. Except that it isn't. The mystery is neither very complex nor very interesting, even to a reader who like me who NEVER figures out whodunnit and never sees the twist coming. In this case, there is no twist; the answer to everything is volcanoes.
But it's Attilius himself who is the real ball-and-chain of this book. If I had to describe his personality, I'd say...he doesn't have one? I guess he's kind of serious and stoic, humorless, not a good leader of men, not especially bright (though Harris seems to want you to think he is). He has a dead wife, which feels like something from the Instant Characterization Toolbox. "What's that? Nothing interesting about the character? I don't know [rummages through toolbox] here, give him this dead wife!"
Attilius's job in this book is not to be a person, but to convey the story forward. His job is to stay on the path, to go where Harris needs him to go. Go where the action is, fix the aqueduct, meet Pliny, visit Pompeii before and after, and so on. He's an unmanned drone taking us on a tour.
All that said, this isn't the worst way to pass the time. It is competently written, largely devoid of hideously amateur genre prose, and it's about ancient Rome, so it can't be all bad. If you've been to Pompeii, that will probably help. Harris's descriptions certainly do recall the place in recognizable ways. But this is no "I, Claudius." You'd be better off re-reading that.
Story-wise, Harris devised a pretty great premise, and then proceeded to march it forward step by deliberate step, occasionally prodding at it with something sharp, until it was devoured by pumice and ash and noxious gasses in the final 50 pages.
That premise is: Something is wrong with the aqueduct that services the towns around the Bay of Naples, and tenderfoot engineer Marcus Attilius is dispatched from Rome to investigate. The previous hydro-engineer, or "aquarius," has vanished without a trace, and it is all quite mysterious. Except that it isn't. The mystery is neither very complex nor very interesting, even to a reader who like me who NEVER figures out whodunnit and never sees the twist coming. In this case, there is no twist; the answer to everything is volcanoes.
But it's Attilius himself who is the real ball-and-chain of this book. If I had to describe his personality, I'd say...he doesn't have one? I guess he's kind of serious and stoic, humorless, not a good leader of men, not especially bright (though Harris seems to want you to think he is). He has a dead wife, which feels like something from the Instant Characterization Toolbox. "What's that? Nothing interesting about the character? I don't know [rummages through toolbox] here, give him this dead wife!"
Attilius's job in this book is not to be a person, but to convey the story forward. His job is to stay on the path, to go where Harris needs him to go. Go where the action is, fix the aqueduct, meet Pliny, visit Pompeii before and after, and so on. He's an unmanned drone taking us on a tour.
All that said, this isn't the worst way to pass the time. It is competently written, largely devoid of hideously amateur genre prose, and it's about ancient Rome, so it can't be all bad. If you've been to Pompeii, that will probably help. Harris's descriptions certainly do recall the place in recognizable ways. But this is no "I, Claudius." You'd be better off re-reading that.