The Nero Prediction [Hardcover]

I personally am 75% of the way through this novel. It is well worth the read. It was recommended to me by my father, who at age 93 has sight that is failing, and uses a reader.

Dad dictated the following review that he asked that I post on Amazon:

"Humphry Knipe's book is so important that I have been making do with the reading machine's deficiencies, slow work but in this case very rewarding. There has been so little attention paid to Nero that the text is fascinating, and nearly every word of it is news to me. Knipe is to be congradualted on discovering a gold mine of information about Nero and presenting it in a remarkable way.

As I read the book I became more and more fascinated by Nero himself, as well as Knipe's presentation of him. He was evidently much more complicated a person than the one usually described to us. This is a completely new view of Nero, and one that is much more sympathetic.

This is wonderful and fills a gap in the knowledge of Nero."

A friend of mine who's a professor of Ancient Roman Studies

suggested that I look at this book. He said that it was

accurate historically. The fact that it's a novel could be misinterpreted since the author is adding dimension to the existing facts while trying to be accurate in his speculation. The result is a fascinating story. Nero was far more than simply

the guy who played his harp while Rome burned. He was a great

artist and actor and patron of the arts. He was treacherous as well and altogether an interesting and complex character.The

dialogue is especially well written and authentic in tone.I

don't know why I haven't heard of Humphry Knipe before this

book. He's on the level of a Gore Vidal or Will Durant.

Is he a screenwriter? Anyway I loved this book and recommend

it to anyone who likes Ancient Rome and a great story based on facts.

I don't have a lot of time to read books. When I do it is usually nonfiction research related to my work in the entertainment field. It was in this capacity that I picked up "The Nero Prediction." Before immersing myself in its revelations, I held most of the common prejudices against the Emperor Nero gathered from movies and college history classes. Being of an iconoclastic nature, however, I was primed for this revisionist take on the Roman dictator, numerologically known by fundamentalist Christians of his day as 666, a.k.a. the Beast.

From the advance publicity on the this book, it appears that Mr. Knipe set out to deliver a wild-and-wooly entertainment for mass consumption, yet researched enough to pass muster with antiquarians. He has succeeded on both fronts. With due diligence backing up his most daring assertions, he casts Nero as the greatest artist of his time--a master Thespian and musician, perhaps the first international pop star, not to mention the inventor of something very close to modern Opera. Think Elton John crossed with Pavarotti and John Belushi.

Not a white-wash by any means, the author vividly reveals-if not revels in--Nero's debauchery and horrific crimes. However, he implies that the impish tyrant's worst offenses-i.e., ordering Christians to be torn apart by dogs and lit afire as living torches for the delight of the mob-occurred late in his reign, were inspired by the victims' own lust for martyrdom and were remarkable--in comparison to the atrocities of other Roman dictators--not for their cruelty but their theatricality.

In his factual afterword, Mr. Knipe states that Nero's bad rap as a bloodthirsty libertine with no redeemable features, arose only after the historical records sympathetic to him were destroyed--along with his voluminous artistic masterpieces. This high crime against culture was perpetrated by the late monarch's ideological opponents, both Stoic and Christian. Prior to his demise, Nero was greatly loved by the Roman plebes for his free spirit, generosity, unprecedented public recitals, patriotism, anti-war stance and willingness to party hardy with the common man. It was these same characteristics which so infuriated the stingy, warmongering and pious Patricians, who constantly plotted his downfall. As for the fanatical, revolutionary Christ cult, it's likely that they would have hated and provoked whomever was on the throne.

Knipe's book is also a groundbreaking study of the absolutely crucial role that astrology played in the affairs of the Roman aristocracy, who consulted their stars habitually in order to determine the best hour to marry their mother or murder their brother. They kept their birth times secret and their horoscopes locked away, so their enemies could not divine the perfect moment to intercede or retaliate. Astrology was hard science, and the concept of self-fulfilling prophecy was barely known. Their only reservations about following the advice of their personal astrologer was that that he might be a quack or worse: in the pocket of their enemy. To my knowledge there is no precedent in historical fiction for the narrative device of astrological prophecy, which gives "The Nero Prediction" it's air of novelty and intellectual kick. (Having finished the book I feel like I could set out a shingle as an astrologer, where before I had only cursory knowledge of the topic.) In this regard I'm reminded of Peter Suskind's magnificent "Perfume: Story of a Murderer" and its innovative device of telling its story from a nose's point of view. Also, like "Perfume," the book is heavily spiced with casual sex, follows a labrynthian plot iinfused with thrilling suspense and is peopled with colorful characters of moral complexity, human frailty and spiritual retardation.

Lastly and most surprisingly, "The Nero Prediction" is a heartfelt buddy story, albeit a tragic one, narrated by Nero's true-life secretary Epaphroditus, a former slave and boyhood friend. Epaphroditus, who idolizes his master's virtuosic creativity, becomes his closest ally and is accorded power second only to Nero's. However, he is prevented from completely enjoying the spoils of his position, for his horoscope foretells that he will one day assassinate his beloved monarch. Although he goes to great lengths to escape said fate, the stars and planets conspire inexorably against him.

The publisher is Process Books, a subsidiary of Adam Parfrey's Feral House, purveyor of fine products on the cutting edge of apocalypse culture, a fitting home for an apologia on behalf of the original Anti-Christ.

Parental discretion advised!

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 7 reviews  4.9 out of 5 stars