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Roma Eterna
by Robert Silverberg
(HarperCollins/Eos, $25.95, 396 pages, hardcover; published in May
2003. UK: Gollancz, £10.99, 385 pages, trade paperback, also available
in hardback priced £16.99, published August 2003. Gollancz, £6.99, 385
pages, paperback, first published 2003, this edition published 22 July
2004.)
Roma Eterna spans more than 1500 years in a world in which the
Roman Empire never .jpg) fell.
The divergence that led to this alternate history reaches back into
antiquity: Moses failed to lead the Hebrews out of Egypt. This is divulged
in the opening vignette, in a discussion between two historians.
Taken individually, all but one of the stories in Roma Eterna
are quite good -- the exception being "An Outpost of the Realm", which
features the book's only female narrator. Robert Silverberg, for all
his considerable storytelling skills, is rarely at ease with female
characters, and this story, with its unconvincing first-person narration,
is an unfortunately pointed example of that weakness.
Certain faults weaken the foundation of Silverberg's grand creation
when considered as a whole. The author concentrates too heavily .jpg) on
the upper middle class, those close to the throne but far from poverty,
thus exploring his world almost exclusively from a privileged perspective.
The language is at times too vague, lacking the details and descriptions
that could illuminate how the world changes from one era to the next.
The cultural influence of the world outside the Empire -- China, the
New World -- is left unsatisfactorily unexplored, especially in comparison
with Kim Stanley Robinson's culturally complex alternate history
The Years of Rice
and Salt (2002).
But Silverberg sprinkles Roma Eterna with just enough Jewish
presence to set up the powerful final story, "To the Promised Land",
in which a self-appointed prophet attempts to lead Hebrews to a new
promised land beyond the reach of the Roman Empire, bringing us back
full circle thematically.
Roma Eterna is an entertaining read, with a generous handful
of exceptionally engaging stories. It's a shame that it falls short
of the great book that it could have been. 
Originally published in
The Montreal Gazette, Saturday, 12 July 2003.
Claude Lalumière's Fantastic Fiction
is a series of
capsule reviews first published in the Saturday Books
section of The Montreal Gazette.
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