Provoking, unsettling, ingenious - and a delight to read

Erudite and witty... The Fall of Troy skilfully interweaves classical and 19th century stories, employing motifs from both Homer and Charlotte Bronte. This is Ackroyd's most exuberant novel for years

Ackroyd imports a Mrs Rochester theme to Turkey, and the denouement has the atmosphere of a thriller, with innocents running for their lives

Lurid and generally entertaining drama

The Fall of Troy is above all a love story, and like the best love stories it deals in obsession, deception, madness and death

A vivid reimagining of the discovery of what may have been the ancient city of Troy. A thought-provoking novel

Beautifully constructed, by turns playful and sinister...this book will haunt the reader's mind

Ingenious..... briskly told and vividly realised tale... a gripping novel

Ackroyd's atmospheric novel begins with a flourish... [and] gradually turns into an almost Faustian tale

Gloomy, surprising and intelligent, Ackroyd's pose is sparse and considered and his characterisation is adroit. This is a compelling novel which never gives away more than it has to

[A]n insightful portrait of a man with only one mission in life

The Fall of Troy is written in the language of the nineteenth century intellectuals but is lively with it, displaying a directness, clarity and faultless brevity throughout. It warns us that the world is full of Heinrich Obermanns who have decided the meaning of what they might uncover before they have even started to dig

Peter Ackroyd takes the reader, in his usual compelling, elegant style, back to Heinrich Schliemann's excavation of that ancient city

Obermann is a lively creation