ghost on the throne

★ Another masterpiece by the author of "The Philosopher and the Powerful Minister"

★ The great emperor is now fallen

★ Where will the Macedonian Empire go?

★ Show the ups and downs of succession dispute

When Alexander the Great died at the age of 32, his empire stretched from the Adriatic Sea in the west to what is today India in the east. In an unusual compromise, his two heirs, his mentally handicapped half-brother Philip III, and his posthumous son Alexander IV shared the regency. But Alexander's six Macedonian generals, driven by their inner lust for power and fueled by the legend that Alexander gave the kingdom "to the strongest," began to vie for supremacy. Alexander's former Greek secretary turned general, Eumenes, was perhaps their most visible but overlooked rival, and Eumenes became the deciding factor in the fate of the precarious royal family. James Rohm, professor of classics at Bard College, draws on archaeological findings and documentary research to present readers with the brutal struggle for control of Greece's greatest empire.