James O'Donnell, The Ruin of the Roman Empire: A New History, Ecco, 978-0060787370, Adrian Goldsworthy, How Rome Fell: Death of a Superpower

James O'Donnell produced absolutely uninspiring account pretending to be a "new history." Battles, alliances and political coups, to which the author attributes the Fall of the Roman Empire constitute a little more than embellished chronological table. Certainly, Roman administrators from time to time antagonized the settlers from outside the limes. The question why barbarian hordes, none of which significantly exceeded male population of a mid-size Roman city with a primitive siege equipment could bring down a civilization remains unanswered or even unasked.

Adrian Goldsworthy's "Death of a Superpower" suffers from essentially the same defect, namely a replacement of logical reasoning with narrative. His narrative is more erudite than O'Donnell's but platitudes like that "Emperors forgot what Empire was about" and suchlike do not replace analysis. The proof that any of the late Roman emperors was less competent than Caligula, Nero or Commode, more beholden to the staff, women and freedmen than Claudius, or more superstitious than Domitian is a practical impossibility. Inability to tie up the military-political narrative to the social and economic fabric of the empire makes useless all sophistication of style.