The Virtues of War: A Novel of Alexander the Great

I have always been a soldier. I have known no other life. So begins Alexander's extraordinary confession on the eve of his greatest crisis of leadership. By turns heroic and calculating, compassionate and utterly merciless, Alexander recounts with a warrior's unflinching eye for detail the blood, the terror, and the tactics of his greatest battlefield victories. Whether surviving his father's brutal assassination, presiding over a massacre, or weeping at the death of a beloved comrade-in-arms, Alexander never denies the hard realities of the code by which he lives: the virtues of war. But as much as he was feared by his enemies, he was loved and revered by his friends, his generals, and the men who followed him into battle. Often outnumbered, never outfought, Alexander conquered every enemy the world stood against him — but the one he never saw coming...

"The drama is high and personalities vivid, and only rarely does the veil of antiquity feel strained....Still, historical drama from Pressfield again ranks among the best and finest." Kirkus Reviews

"The rapidly paced first-person narrative is distinguished by Alexander's own matter-of-fact voice....This splendid fictional biography is calculated to appeal to antiquarians, Grecophiles, and fans of a darn good read." Booklist

"Pressfield's exceptionally vivid prose evokes the period, and his play-by-play descriptions of the weapons, formations, strategies, and individual bouts should please the most meticulous military history buff." Library Journal

"[E]xhilarating....Though it is a novel, The Virtues of War often reads instead like Alexander's diary, personal in tone and contemplative of its subject. Pressfield has crafted an engaging character study that is relevant to us today." South Florida Sun-Sentinel

In the brilliantly imagined first-person voice of Alexander the Great, acclaimed novelist Pressfield brings to life his epic battles, his unerring command of his forces, and the passions and ambitions that drove him.

A historical novel chronicling the life of Alexander the Great follows the powerful leader from his rise to the throne of Macedon at the age of twenty, his conquest of much of the known world, including the mighty Persian Empire, before the age of twenty-five, to his early death at the age of thirty-three, offering a multifaceted portrait of a complex man. Reprint. 35,000 first printing.

Steven Pressfield is the author of the novels Last of the Amazons, The Legend of Bagger Vance, Gates of Fire, and Tides of War. He lives in California where he is at work on his next historical novel.