Revenge in Athens: From the Files of Lysias the Lawyer

Revenge in Athens is the second novel by Rick Garnett, the author of I, Paris , a critically acclaimed retelling of the story of Helen of Troy. Set in Athens in the turbulent years immediately following the war with Sparta, Revenge in Athens recounts the efforts of Lysias, the greatest of contemporary Athenian lawyers , to defend a poor farmer accused of killing Eratosthenes, the aristocratic lover of his beautiful young wife. Beginning with two of the most dramatic of Lysias’ surviving works, the book draws on numerous other sources, and on the author’s imagination, to paint a non-idealized picture of a radically male-dominated society filled with passionate antagonisms and litigious zeal. In this framework Lysias, strives to extricate his client from the deadly toils of the complex Athenian legal system, and thereby also to achieve partial revenge for the death of brother at the hands of the same Eratosthenes. Lysias is aided in this effort by Timon, his skillful man-Friday, and his alluring, perspicacious mistress, Metaneira. Throughout the story the author weaves informative set pieces, revealing vignettes of often-neglected aspects of Athenian society, and vivid glimpses of the inner lives and relations of his characters, leading to a surprising finale.