[sun surfer]

Here's some of the others I was considering if it might help your search, or just for anyone interested in other books for this topic:

Defying Hitler by Sebastian Haffner (about the lead up to the Third Reich, which of course 'third reich' means third empire after the previous German one and, ahem, the Roman Empire)

A God Strolling in the Cool of the Evening by Mário de Carvalho (set in the Roman Empire in what is now Portugal; I really wanted to nominate this but didn't see any ebooks)

Fire From Heaven by Mary Renault (about the young Alexander)

The Ides of March by Thornton Wilder (about Julius Caesar and in epistolary form, and I loved Thornton's Bridge of San Luis Rey)

The Ides of April by Lindsey Davis (a mystery set in ancient Rome)

Christ Stopped at Eboli by Carlo Levi (set in the much more modern Italy, but still in the centre of where the Roman Empire had been and by an Italian descended from Romans, and referencing Christ who of course was famously tangled up in the Roman Empire)

The Secret History: A Novel of Empress Theodora by Stephanie Thornton

The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare (about a fierce, hotheaded young man bent on revenging his father’s death by forcing the Romans from his land of Israel)

Eagle in the Snow by Wallace Breem