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An epic of grand adventure and finely realized characters. Sostratos, long and rangy, intellectual and curious, chases knowledge as ardently as his cousin chases women; Menedemos, nearly as perfect a physical specimen as Alexander himself, is the headstrong man of the sea, his eyes unable to resist the veiled beauties around him . . . including his young stepmother, Baukis, whose voice and form he struggles to ignore. Having profitably returned on the Aphrodite to Rhodes, the two cousins find that war threatens their once free-trading world. Alexander the Great's successors are warring for control of the eastern Mediterranean. The ruthless one-eyed general Antigonos, who draws on the strength of all Anatolia, and his rival Ptolemaios, who controls the endless wealth of Egypt, are each ruthlessly maneuvering for advantage . . . and the neutrality of Rhodes, so essential to commerce, may be coming to an end. Yet though war and rumors of war surround them, Sostratos and Menedemos need to turn a profit. It seems the height of folly to try one's luck so strenuously, but Sostratos has come into possession of what he is convinced is the skull of the mythical gryphon, the fabled beast with the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a lion. They sail to Athens, intending to sell it to a school of philosophy. And the Egyptian emeralds they've obtained on the cheap promise to make them an even tidier profit. But between the Aphrodite and Athens lie two war fleets, innumerable pirates, and enough danger and intrigue to satisfy even Homer. Unfortunately, it may be more than Sostratos and Menedemos can hope to survive. |
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Author: H. N. Turteltaub Title: The Gryphon's Skull Series: Menedemos & Sostratos First Published by: Forge Place: Format: HC Date: January 2003 ISBN-10: 0312872224 ISBN-13: 9780312872229 |
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