What did the reviewers expect? An elegant disquisition on the pitfalls of modern marriage? A tragi-comic look at what can go wrong when you move to the country? ... [This is] a gothic fantasy ... there is a Joycean freedom to its playfulness ... [and] his writing on loss and ageing can be exquisite. ... It's a carnivalesque antidote to all those earnest, urban epics by the graduate trainees of the literary scene. ... Inimitable and irreplaceable. Long may he joyously jiggle his art in our faces, whether we like it or not

In this, his first novel, he delivers superb prose fiction from start to finish. A spellbinding, gnostic tale about the world on a downward spiral

The book works…more than that; at times it sings… Thrillers are supposed to thrill, but few really do raise your heart rate and short-circuit your critical faculties…Exhilarating…This trilogy deserves the highest compliment that can be paid to a work of historical fiction

Robert Harris completes his wonderful trilogy based on the life of Cicero. I haven’t enjoyed Roman history more since Robert Graves’s I, Claudius

Harris’s fascination with politics galvanises his impressive knowledgeableness into compulsive fiction

Harris is brilliant at the political then-as-now, giving Caesar with a hint of Blair – and also of Thatcher

Staying close to the sources, Harris picks his way masterfully through Cicero’s personal and political dilemmas…superb…does full justice to one of Rome’s most interesting complex and humane statesmen, whose pragmatic political treatises proved so influential during the renaissance and enlightenment

Harris skilfully navigates these fraught years in Cicero’s life … Dictator triumphs

A superior historical thriller

Harris’ version of Cicero is a tremendous creation

[Dictator's] gripping dramas and powerful themes - the fragility of democracy and the fallibility of human beings among them - richly illuminate the conflicts of its era and our own

Superb…confirms Harris’s undisputed place as our leading master of both the historical and contemporary thriller

Harris is a masterful storyteller. I’m currently experiencing that terrible phase of cold turkey after finishing something superb

Contemporary echoes abound in this endlessly fascinating exploration of power struggles

Triumphant

A masterful story of political intrigue…a fascinating and absorbing novel

Robert Harris is an incomparable storyteller... It's a brutal tale of murder and mayhem and a tour de force of research and imagination...

I’m a big fan of Robert Harris so I’d like to read his latest, Dictator… Robert is very good at politics and evoking a period

Sinuous, clever and compelling…A fitting end to a magnificent trilogy

A riveting read

Robert Harris brings his Cicero trilogy to a triumphant, compelling and deeply moving conclusion…The three novels are surely the finest fictional treatment of Ancient Rome in the English language…distinguished by a mastery of the sources, sympathetic imagination, political intelligence and narrative skill

Harris’ Cicero is a bit special – a mix of genius and craft, kindness and pomposity, ambition and principle

Penetrating and utterly compelling

In Dictator, Robert Harris brings his trilogy on Cicero to a triumphant end. As one who has himself written novels set in the last years of the Roman republic and the first century of empire, I am happy to say that Harris reigns supreme. His Cicero is magnificent; couldn’t conceivably be done better

Baume’s writing is poetic, delicate and inventive … and despite the undertow of humour, there’s not one whiff of sentimentality – you’re left with the sadness and chronic fearfulness of the truly lonely

[A] skilful debut … lyrical and impressive.

An extraordinarily fresh style …this is an atmospheric novel …Baume is undoubtedly an exceptional new talent.

Ambitious.

There is a lovely, lilting cadence to the novel… Stylishly done…. Winterson manages against the odds to keep us gripped.

Winterson is on sparkling form in this highly intelligent and daringly imaginative reworking of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale... Witty, clever and bold.

Winterson is incapable of being dull, and The Gap Of Time is a fitting addition to her uniquely inventive catalogue.

She deftly captures all the magic and raw emotion of the original.