The Last Assassin

The final years of the Roman republic are usually recounted from the top, through the eyes of the big winners and losers: Brutus, Mark Antony, Emperor Augustus. But THE LAST ASSASSIN, a thrilling narrative history, will tell the well-known history from an exciting new perspective.

For fourteen years after 44 BC, Cassius of Parma (Cassius Parmensis), one of the lesser-known assassins of Julius Caesar, watched from the wings as all of his co-conspirators were murdered. He was a man of the Roman navy who chose every side in the empire's civil wars except the winning one; he was a playwright whose work was said to have been stolen by and published by the man sent to kill him; he is in the back row of the plotters, many of them Caesar's friends, who killed to prevent a tyranny. And although he was the most successful at evading the future emperor Augustus's revenge, Cassius has been little more than a historical footnote - until now.

In telling the story of Cassius's flight from justice, THE LAST ASSASSIN opens up a fascinating and well-known segment of Roman history from a new angle. The Battle of Actium, where Cassius fought on the losing side, decided the final civil war of the Roman republic - the empire established from Augustus' victory lasted until 1453. This book will chart an epic turn of history through the eyes of an ordinary man, participating in a world-changing sequence of events. It's also a gripping story of fear, revenge and survival.