Fortune's Favorites [antikvár]

It is my intention that Fortune's Favorites be read with full enjoyment as a complete, free-standing novel, without the necessity of having previously read The Grass Crown or The First Man in Rome. The synopses below provide a brief summary of those two books for the reader's convenience and enhanced enjoyment. EVENTS CHRONICLED IN THE FIRST MAN IN ROME The year is 110 b.c. More by accident than design, the Republic of Rome has begun to acquire her territorial empire, a process of expansion that has placed increasingly intolerable strains upon an antique constitution. This constitution had been designed to regulate the affairs of a small city-state and protect the interests of its ruling class, embodied still in 110 b.c. by the Senate. The true profession of Rome was war, which she conducted superbly and had come to rely upon in order to maintain growth and a thriving economy; she also kept the various other nations within Italy in a subordinate position by denying their peoples the Roman citizenship and parity in commerce. But the voice of the People had become louder, and a series of political demagogues like the Brothers Gracchi had arisen with the avowed intention of depriving the Senate of its power. Power was to be transferred to the People in the persons of a slightly lower echelon of Roman citizens, the knights, who were primarily wealthy businessmen. (Agitation for social change in the ancient world was never undertaken on behalf of the poor, but rather took the form of a struggle