
Buy this book
Books N Bytes participates in affiliate programs including Amazon Associates and Bookshop.org. We may earn a commission when you purchase through our links at no extra cost to you.
The Godless Man is the Paul Doherty Alexander mystery set in the aftermath of the Issus campaign, with Alexander's army moving through Persia and Telamon, the royal investigator, working a temple-related murder case that involves both Persian priesthoods and Macedonian soldiery in uncomfortable cooperation.
Doherty handles the religious-political layer with the kind of careful research the series rewards. The Persian temple practices and the Macedonian campaign politics are rendered as distinct and credible institutional cultures. The mystery itself is fair.
Three stars. Recommended to series readers. Doherty by this point has the form running smoothly and the Persian-empire material is among his most interesting historical territory.
Related reads
If you liked The Godless Man

A Murder in Thebes
by Paul C. Doherty
A Paul Doherty Alexander the Great mystery. Ancient Greek setting, careful research, a puzzle worth your evening.

The House of Death
by Paul C. Doherty
A Paul Doherty Alexander the Great mystery. Murder in a Persian palace. Reliable historical fair-play procedural.

Bury Me Deep
by Megan Abbott
Megan Abbott rewriting a real 1930s Phoenix murder case as a fever dream. Period noir with a feminist undertow.

The End of Everything
by Megan Abbott
Megan Abbott writing a thirteen-year-old's point of view as her best friend disappears. Quiet, devastating, almost too uncomfortable to recommend.

River Of Darkness
by Rennie Airth
The first John Madden mystery. Post-WWI English countryside, a returning detective, and a serial killer whose methods come straight from the trenches.

The Winter Queen
by Boris Akunin
The first Erast Fandorin novel. A young clerk in 1876 Moscow investigates an apparent suicide and falls down a labyrinth.
More by this author