Hannibal's invasion of Italia in 218 BC was one of the boldest mountain military operations of the Second Punic War, if not the entire ancient world. A master of warfare, he remains an enigmatic figure known mainly from descriptions written by his adversaries. In this unique work of fiction, Hannibal, a Carthaginian, member of a North African banking family and the son of a famous general, is accurately depicted as a strong leader who spent his entire life fighting the Romans. His restless, investigative mind, along with a deep love and appreciation of Greek culture, was nurtured into the Carthaginian war machine by his father and brother-in-law. Hannibal was elected Commander-in-Chief of the Carthaginian Army by the troops in 221. In late spring 218, his army of 65,000 men and 37 elephants left Cartagena in Spain, subdued tribes on the fringes of the Pyrénées Mountains, crossed southern Gaul into the Rhône Basin, and marched across the Alps into Italia. The Warmaker: Hannibal's Invasion of Italia and the Aftermath provides a fictional account of the war master, and what could likely have happened, following his military success in Italia, had he decided to conquer Rome.

From the critically acclaimed author of The Mercy of Thin Air comes the profound story of a strong, resilient woman who risks everything to be true to herself, “an otherworldly tale that charts the all-too-human territory between heartbreak and hope” (Deborah Harkness, New York Times bestselling author of A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night). In an ancient time, in a faraway land, a young woman named Aoife is allowed a rare apprenticeship to become her kingdom’s mapmaker, tasked with charting the entire domain. Traveling beyond its borders, she finds a secretive people who live in peace, among great wealth. They claim to protect a mythic treasure, one connected to the creation of the world. When Aoife reports their existence to her kingdom, the community is targeted as a threat. Aoife is exiled for treason and finds refuge among the very people who had been declared her enemy. With them, she begins a new life surrounded by kindness, equality, and cooperation. But within herself, Aoife has no peace. She cannot share the grief she feels for the home and children she left behind, nor can she bear the warrior scars of the man she comes to love. And when she gives birth to their gifted daughter, Aoife cannot avoid what the child forces her to confront about her past and its truth. On this most important of journeys, there is no map to guide her.

If pacifists are correct in thinking that war is always unjust, then it follows that we ought to eliminate the possibility and temptation of ever engaging in it; we should not build war-making capacity, and if we already have, then demilitarization—or military abolition—would seem to be the appropriate course to take. On the other hand, if war is sometimes justified, as many believe, then it must be permissible to prepare for it by creating and maintaining a military establishment. Yet this view that the justifiability of war-making is also sufficient to justify war-building is mistaken. This book addresses questions of jus ante bellum, or justice before war. Under what circumstances is it justifiable for a polity to prepare for war by militarizing? When (if ever) and why (if at all) is it morally permissible to create and maintain the potential to wage war? In doing so it highlights the ways in which a civilian population compromises its own security in maintaining a permanent military establishment, explores the moral and social costs of militarization, and evaluates whether or not these costs are worth bearing.