Book Description
The Chronicle of Zenobia is the story of the Queen of Palmyra who led her country in rebellion against Rome and almost overturned the Roman Empire. It is a huge tale of war, love, sex, high life and politics, religious turmoil, murder, heroism and romance.
When Simon, a brilliant young man blessed with a perfect memory, becomes friend and advisor to Odenathus, the great warrior-king of Palmyra, the city’s gamble with destiny unfolds. The first signs of the terrible turmoil that will befall the East are already visible. The Persian King of Kings sets out to conquer Roman Mesopotamia. Rome itself is in the grip of violent disorders and the Empire on the brink of civil war. Law and order is collapsing. One Emperor after another falls to the assassin’s knife. Almost alone, Palmyra must defend itself: the Roman presence in Syria is all but non-existent.
During these events, Odenathus marries his cousin, the beautiful and clever Zenobia, behind whose beautiful dark eyes, he discovers, is a will of iron. Through the ups and downs of a stormy marriage, she struggles to turn herself from a wife into a queen. With Simon as her closest friend, she becomes a force to be reckoned with in the affairs of the city – and soon a power in all Syria. When Odenathus is poisoned, she seizes the regency on behalf of her son, and becomes the ruler of all the East. Her armies sweep into Egypt and she is hailed as ‘the New Cleopatra’.
Book I (‘The World as It Was’) brings this beautiful, powerful woman out of obscurity and tells who she was and what she did. It vividly recreates the tumultuous times, with the people of Palmyra, high-born and low, confronted with wars, usurpations and intrigues on all sides.
