A fitting end to the trilogy, even if it’s pretty depressing. Book 1, the protasis, was the youth of a growing Alexander. Book 2, the epitasis, was Alexander at the height of his power until he couldn’t go further. Book 3, the catastrophe, is the fallout of everything that happened in the first two, which was chaos, violence and envy. 323 BC and 322BC were interesting and suspenseful because of the fragility of everyone’s position, but after that I thought the events were strung together too loosely.

This book also returned to the multiple third person narration from book 1, and I liked seeing the world of the adult Alexander through multiple perspectives. Bagoas, while interesting, was a very biased narrator who saw Alexander through rose-coloured glasses and didn’t care for the politics of Alexander’s empire. This book offers everyone’s opinion’s of each other and of themselves. Alliances change and so do they.
Since book 1, there was little the child Alexander could ever do wrong. He was presented as the beloved shining light of the first two books and I guess that worked a little too well? After the immediate rush following his death, I didn’t care as much about the events that followed. If not Alexander, who is supposed to be loved now? The poor Arridaios? He had my sympathy, at least. ( )

A historical novel that dramatizes the struggle for control of the Macedonian Empire after the death of Alexander the Great. Created by a stunning string of military victories and alliances, Alexander's empire stretched from Greece to Egypt to the border of India. The book is well-plotted as it covers the major battles, murderous demises, and power plays in the dozen or so years after Alexander's death. However, the writing is sloppy, sometimes to the point of confusion, the style is overly formal, and the book is full of typos. Despite that, it's an exciting story that demonstrates just how extraordinary Alexander was to both have created his empire and then managed to hold it together.
This is the final book in Mary Renault's Alexander trilogy, following "Fire From Heaven" and "The Persian Boy," neither of which I've read. ( )

Ms. Renault's third & final volume of her Alexander the Great trilogy. More of her same engaging brilliance in this great history-based Alexander trilogy. ( )

Alexander's death sparks rivalries for power over his empire.

The first two novels in Renault's Alexander trilogy, Fire from Heaven and The Persian Boy, were outstanding. Funeral Games, however, lacks the strong narrative voice or central character of the first two; not only does Alexander die early in the novel, but the point of view shifts throughout the novel, following various characters as they scheme to hold onto as much as they can of Alexander's empire. Characters are introduced or brought back onstage from the previous books, grasp for power, and are murdered, but the restrictions of historical events make this more of a sequence of events than a coherent plot. It's not a bad book, but not a great one. ( )