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Hear me! My name is Gorgon. I am a Spartan queen. I come to tell you a story, a story

unlike any that has been told before. It is the story of the greatest war ever fought.

Years had lasted. Famous cities went up in flames. Mighty heroes, the pride of Greece and

Asia, won undying glory for themselves. Some died before their time, and their shades fled

down to the underworld. Others, when the war was done, met with equally unhappy fates. One

returning from the war was murdered in his own palace. Another, a man of tricks and turns,

the great schemer who did more than anyone else to secure victory for the Greeks,

roams the world this day. Who knows if he will ever make it home.

I, too, in the years since the war have roamed the world, I have spoken to those who fought and

survived. I have tore the fields and sailed the waters where the battles were decided. I have

sought to understand everything that happened. How it was that East and West came to go to war.

I played my own small part. I will tell you how. But this is not just my story. It is the story

of everyone who played a part. Gods as well as men. A story unlike any you will ever have read.

So that, Tom Holland, as you well know, is the beginning of the book The Wolf Girl, The Greeks and

The Gods. By, would you believe Tom Holland yourself? You've basically, you persuaded me to read

out your own book to you. I did. This is a podcast about Herodotus, the father of history.

We could have started with Herodotus, but you've chosen to start with Holland. Explain yourself, Tom.

Shameless self-promotion. So yes, so the premise of this book is that

...