The Sands of Ammon

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

Reviewed by Coral

Alexander continues to follow his dream of building a lasting empire, moving deeper into the Persian Empire and into Egypt. But in order to establish this empire he must defeat a general who might be his match: Memnon, a Greek mercenary employed by Darius.

Spelling mistakes always bother me in works that are supposed to be edited: Alexander’s horse’s name is spelt three different ways; there’s a “her” instead of “he”.

I had the same problems in this book that I did in the first one: the thin characterization of many of the characters, though, weirdly, the character who I felt was the most engaging was the enemy soldier Memnon; the two women Alexander had relationships with in the first book are back, and there was way too much time spent on the artist’s wife still wanting Alexander and making her husband jealous.

I did have some new complaints about this book. Alexander sleeps with a priestess at Troy, which I didn’t like especially because the Troy story is a big part of the Alexander and Hephaestion story. There was a lot of time spent on the investigation into the murder of Alexander’s father, King Philip, which I feel would have made more sense in the last book. There was also a scene in the book which, to me, read as rape. I don’t care if Alexander had previously made his feelings for Memnon’s wife, Barsine, clear, he can’t fully give consent if he is so feverish that he doesn’t know what is happening around him.

Normally I would not even read the third book because of this, but a part of me wants to see how Hephaestion’s death is handled.

 Grade: F