Nero Trilogy

From this New York Times bestselling author, the first novel in a new trilogy that finds Empress Agrippina and her young son, Nero, fending off ambitious rivals while shaping their own destiny, if Nero is to become the most feared and notorious emperor of them all. The story begins with a hand curled around another man's throat. This is Roman justice: Emperor Tiberius first dispatches a traitor, a friend he once trusted with the city, then the man's whole family and all of his friends. It is as if he never existed. Into this fevered forum, a child is born. His mother is Agrippina, granddaughter of Emperor Augustus. But their imperial blood is neither balm nor protection. Rather, it is a liability. Blood is easily spilled or poisoned. So swiftly corrupted. As the aging, paranoid Tiberius becomes blind to the ignoble end awaiting him, Agrippina sees the future. Her once-exiled brother Caligula is next in succession, which brings her another step closer to the heart of the empire-to power, ambition, and danger. Every day she will face soldiers, senators, rivals, silver-tongued pretenders, each vying for position. One mistake risks exile, incarceration, execution. Or, worst of all, perhaps the loss of her infant son. Because Agrippina knows that, even in your darkest moments, opportunity rises. Her son is everything. She can make this boy, shape him into Rome itself-the man before whom all must kneel. But first, Agrippina and Nero must survive...

From New York Times bestselling author Conn Iggulden, the second novel in this new trilogy finds newly-crowned Emperor Nero fending off court rivals while embracing his fate as the most feared, notorious ruler in Roman history. Ancient Rome, 50 AD. Agrippina secures her son Lucius's fate through her marriage to Emperor Claudius. Though more intelligent than her previous husbands-and with a power that is absolute-for a time she bends her husband to her will. Claudius is gentle as a lamb with a rope around its neck. So it is, that Lucius is adopted into the imperial family and becomes Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus. But this is merely the first of many moves in the game of power. As mother and son risk everything-their alliances and betrayals, their cruelties and crimes, their brilliance and their ambition-this vivid tapestry is brought brilliantly to life by Conn Iggulden in Tyrant.