Pompeii by Robert Harris

AZ: "A sweltering week in late August. Where better to enjoy the last days of summer than on the beautiful Bay of Naples? But even as Rome's richest citizens relax in their villas around Pompeii and Herculaneum, there are ominous warnings that something is going wrong. Wells and springs are failing, a man has disappeared, and now the greatest aqueduct in the world - the mighty Aqua Augusta - has suddenly ceased to flow...Through the eyes of four characters - a young engineer, an adolescent girl, a corrupt millionaire and an elderly scientist - Robert Harris brilliantly recreates a luxurious world on the brink of destruction"

Was unsure how the days leading up to the reruption of Vesuvius in Roman times would make for a novel but Harris' sideways approach via the volcanic damage to an aqueduct, the tensions in the life of the aquarian Marcus Attilius sent to fix the aqueduct is set against the countdown to the eruption and the knowledge of what happened to the people of Pompeii and Herculaneum. A quick read but very interesting. Not the finess of Faulks but a good engaging story which has me caring about the main and periperal characters.