Agente de Bizancio (Agent of Byzantium) Book

The Roman Emperor, Constantine, accomplished many things, among them were the reorganizing of the Empire, moving its capitol from Rome to a city straddling the Black Sea and the Mediterranean that he called Constantinople. That capitol and that part of the Empire lasted for a thousand years though some of those centuries were very tough times. The rise of the Ottoman Empire was its doom.

Harry Turtledove imagines that Islam never arose and that this Byzantine Empire continues to exist and thrive. In this book of separate stories, he tackles what might be some key issues for that Empire and the challenges fall to his warrior/investigator, Argyros.

"This book…draws heavily on my academic background. It's set in the early fourteenth century of an alternate world where Muhammad, instead of founding Islam, is converted to Christianity." He becomes a key saint. Argyros rises in the Empire to become a ranking member of its "Central Intelligence Agency." These stories bring us into a world both familiar and different than our own history books tell us.

We meet the barbarian peoples of the Caucasus and the steppes; the Egyptians, the Franks and Lombards and Lithuanians; as well as, those closest to Constantinople. The battle of religions between Byzantium and the Persian Empire is another interesting piece of the background. We witness how the invention of the telescope, the printing press and "greek fire" are passed on and/or suppressed. We see the devastation of disease and riot.

The stories themselves each have a mystery or problem to solve. Turtledove makes it all very interesting, even for the casual reader.