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The King’s Gambit cover art

The King’s Gambit

By: John Maddox Roberts
Narrated by: John Lee
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Summary

Blackmail, corruption, treachery, murder - the glory that was Rome.

In this Edgar Award-nominated mystery, John Maddox Roberts takes listeners back to a Rome filled with violence and evil. Vicious gangs ruled the streets of Crassus and Pompey, routinely preying on plebeian and patrician alike. So the garroting of a lowly ex-slave and the disembowelment of a foreign merchant in the dangerous Subura district seemed of little consequence to the Roman hierarchy. But Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger, highborn commander of the local vigiles, was determined to investigate. Despite official apathy, brazen bribes, and sinister threats, Decius uncovers a world of corruption at the highest levels of his government that threatens to destroy him and the government he serves.

©2007 John Maddox Roberts (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

What listeners say about The King’s Gambit

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

No Falco, this.

Dreadful mannered delivery with weird cadence. The story may be good - I will never know, I couldn't bear any more after the first three chapters.

The writing is clunky and self-aware, particularly if you are a fan of Lindsay Davis'work, with plot props thrown in before there is properly a plot.

Free or not I couldn't recommend this.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

couldn't finish

couldn't finish, but then I couldn't hardly say I atarted. very odd tone of narrative that I couldn't endure

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Not good

Ruined by verry odd robotic narration. . Couldn't listen to it. which is a first.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Entertaining

I chose this book as I like the narrator John Lee, and was not dissapointed. Indeed, given some of the previous reviews I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the story.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

A roman Sherlock Holmes.

Its fun, gives you plenty of insight into history, and paints pictures of some of the giants of history.
A bit too detailed for a supposed tale told from memory a lifetime later, but its overall a fun book. As a history buff, its extra fun hearing some of Rome’s giants as mere background characters, or humans doing mundane stuff.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Started slow but finished with a bang!

I didn’t expect much as I don’t know the author and chose it because the reader was John Lee. It turned out quite interesting as it was my first experience of a Roman criminal investigation. I might have a look at the next books of the series.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Dull

Terrible narration and plodding story. Could have persevered - it might be worth reading if on holiday- but not listening to. Hurt my ears, such a strange delivery.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Very enjoyable

An excellent story. Having listened to Mike Duncan’s podcast The History of Rome it was easy to follow the characters and place them into the overall historical context. I found the narration really good. The matter of fact delivery gave the impression of listening to a detailed report on actual events. This may sound somewhat geeky but I thought it brilliant.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
  • Jk
  • 02-01-23

A good start

I have seen these books often over the years but only recently started to read or listen to them.

The underlying plots will be familiar to Roman history buffs but will probably be accessible to any reader. Possibly more accessible to a relative newcomer as the storyline is approached quite obliquely and I struggled sometimes to mesh the storyline with my understanding of real events. The quirks of Roman law and society are well explained where necessary but not in a patronising way - just enough.

The characters are well performed and the narration is good after the first few minutes.

I am still not really clear on the basis of the personal enmity between our hero and Clodius but perhaps that’s just me.

Engaging story and lovely ending.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Too much teaching

I played this at 2x speed, so that the narrator's pacing that everyone else has spoken about wasn't noticeable.

However, my main problem with this book is that the first-person narrator regularly digresses into teaching us about Roman customs. The most egregious, to my mind, is when he has agreed to meet someone at a specific time and there's this whole digressions about sundials, water-clocks and Roman hours being different in winter. At the end of which, the narrating character goes "I'll just guess like everyone else"!

My other major problem with this book is the frequent fourth-wall-breaks. The book begins inside the head of the protagonist, living his life in the Roman republic but then he meets a historical figure who is famous later, turns to the reader and says "I know what you're thinking".
At which point, it transpires that the protagonist is retelling this episode from his youth some 60 years later. And that doesn't work for me because the way humans retell memories is significantly less detailed than if we're a fly inside someone's head.

Also, the protagonist never works out who the killer is. It's thrust upon him when he's confronting the mastermind behind the murders and the killer tries to kill him.
And Roberts seems to think he's writing a new Bond. The sex, the street-fighting and chase scenes, and expecting the mastermind to explain their dastardly plan.

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