Giveaway: The Poison King. Plus Announcing Previous Giveaway Winners

Another giveaway! But first things first — admin. We are revealing the names of the winners of previous contests. They are…

For Mrs. Rowe’s Little Book of Southern Pies, the winners are: Mary Prather, Susan M. and Frances Hunter. For The New York Review of Books 2010 Calendar, the lucky five are: Colleen, Vicky Alvear Shecter, Jen, Aurora Leigh Barrett and Claudette Raynor. Congratulations! We’d like to thank everyone who commented for their creative entries. Winners will be emailed for mailing address information shortly. And now, without further ado, we have another giveaway.

You know you’re bad when you can count Machiavelli as one of your fans. Well, Mithradates inherited a wealthy Black Sea kingdom at age fourteen after his mother poisoned his father. Apparently, Mother passed on this special skill to son since Mithradates’ own mastery of poison allowed him to foil assassination attempts and eliminate rivals. Read more about him in the aptly-titled The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, Rome’s Deadliest Enemy by Adrienne Mayor. In fact, you may read a bit about Mithradates’ incredible trek over the Caucasus now right here at Wonders & Marvels.

For a chance to own a copy of this book, we are giving away two. Just comment to enter for a chance to win by midnight Eastern time on December 3, 2009 in response to this question: Who (real or fictitious) is your favorite storied character out of Ancient Rome and why? Winners will be announced soon after the draw. Sorry, but we can only ship to North America at this time. Good luck!