🧡 Quick note: this is the third in a series and the first I heard. You can do this. I was able to follow the plot just fine. BUT, it’s a bit like being the outsider in a group of friends, where you don’t get the in-jokes. So, my recommendation is to start at the very beginning. Which, I am reliably told, is a very good place to start. Speaking of which…

💚 So, we have an all-knowing narrator with a penchant for hyperbolic similes and snarky asides. His tone is a mix of bemusement, circumspection and alarm with a good dose of stiff upper lip. Basically somewhere between Dr Gregory House and Arthur Dent. Then we have a whole cast of historic and mythical characters as seen through a funhouse mirrorscape. For example, Socrates is an assassin.

💜 I cannot express how much I love this. Except I can and I will. I love the Monty-Python-esque smart silliness, the themes both underlying and face-smackingly overt, the performance (see below) and the characters. I enjoyed every devastating destruction of the fourth wall and every moment of artistic licence with historic characters.