The Battle of Salamis - Barry Strauss

The book is what the title suggests, a discussion of the battle at Salamis between the Hellenic League and the Persian Empire. Strauss actually starts before that, with the basically simultaneously battles at Artemisium and Thermopylae, the former a naval battle, the latter a land one. The Persians didn't really lose either engagement. The Greek naval withdrew, the Spartans were wiped out, but the toll was a tad higher than Xerxes had expected, which plays a role in the mentality of certain key figures.

What Strauss tries to do is give an overview, not just of the battle or the run up to it, but also of the different acts that lead to it, and the fallout. He supplements this by zooming in on various figures who are either important (Themistocles, Xerxes), or simply notable in some respect. These can be a mixed bag. Some of them are interesting, as are the attempts by Strauss to give the most accurate picture of what took place given conflicting or incomplete records. Others feel pointless, filler pieces. There were a few occasions where I got tired of interludes describing Tetramnestus, king of Sidon, or Hermotimus the eunuch, and wanted Strauss to get to the description of the actual battle. I at least understood how Tetramnestus might be relevant, as he was a Phoenician king, and they were the best sailors Xerxes had. I still don't know why we needed to hear about Hermotimus. Your mileage with the book will depend at least in part on how much you enjoy those micro-scale descriptions of the battle.

Strauss might be a bit too biased in favor of Themistocles. For the most part, Themistocles deserves it, if he was as clever as the records indicate. Still, I wasn't so quick to brush aside his demand of tribute from some of the islands the Persians had previously conquered or frightened into submission. Perhaps Strauss is just more understanding of what was culturally acceptable at the time.

The description of how the Persians might view the war overall was quite amusing. Essentially, the Persians marched into Greece, slaughtered the Spartans at Thermopylae, burned Athens, and having demonstrated their power, left so the Greeks could resume killing each other. The Persians meanwhile, would fortify their current empire, rather than expand it dangerously. It's an interesting perspective to take, the moreso for being technically accurate (though any failures are blamed on people other than the Great King of the day, naturally). So there's a fair bit of wit and humor in the writing, to be expected when dealing with the Ancient Greeks, who all apparently loved to get in jibes at each other.