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srm's review
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
Utterly enthralling look at the world's first recorded pandemic, the Antonine plague. For anyone interested in how the the best years of the Roman Empire (the Pax Romana) came to an end, the history of pandemics, or the Roman Empire in general, this is a must.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic
kangetsu's review
informative
medium-paced
3.5
Topic matter is interesting and writing style digestible, but it struggled to keep my attention for longer spans of time.
ALC provided by Libro.fm and Princeton audio.
ALC provided by Libro.fm and Princeton audio.
annamholle's review against another edition
informative
3.75
I picked this up because Colin Elliott taught a seminar on the fall of the Roman Republic at IU that I took in 2020 during the pandemic. I thought it would be an interesting read! And it was. Basically, if you want to know more about the decline of the Roman Empire in the context of the Antonine Plague, this is the book for you. As for the writing, it’s no David Grann, but I suppose it’s harder to establish narrative in a book set during a time period with few sources. The writing does have character, though; you might even laugh a bit. I also appreciated the use of graphs and statistical analysis the evidence. Readers might find it frustrating that a lot of the answers in this book aren’t complete answers, but I think that is what makes ancient history so compelling. There are so many things we can’t and won’t know about it. 3.75