Theophilus (Theo) Vardas, the Byzantine hard-boiled private sleuth. It's a fictional crime novel with a Historical background, yet a Noir wannabe novel. All P. Is in the Noir literature have come out the same mold, from Sam Spade to Dirty Harry, heavy drinkers, womanizers, big mouth and insolent, all mavericks. A Byzantine era one came out from the same mold, why he should be different? The Noir genre though, especially on the silver screen, have always had a social background attached to the crime plot. The Vardas series carry, or at least I try to, incorporate all the ingredients to the Noir soup. Here's an extract to avoid any more description about the book: Ι am Greek not necessarily by birth and passport but as by education. I declare apatrid and hence anti-patriotic. Patriotism is the last refuge on any scoundrel after all (Samuel Johnson). I strongly believe that if Christianity had not been imposed in Greece - and all over the world probably - the humanity's development could have been different. Greece had always been widely open to all religions and ideas. It had always assimilated, elaborated, filtered, transformed and "re-born" almost anything into the immense machine of Democracy and the free will of every individual's choices. No religion was imposed, no specific god; every one, or every city/community, was free to choose one's faith. When Greece was FORCED to accept Christianity, it was no longer a free state but a state under occupation. And this, is certainly much too humiliating for a state of such a history, or for any country if that matters. The education of the Greeks was founded upon a poet and not any prophet or savior or miracle doer. The Greeks had realized far too many years before the self-tragedy of being. Then came Christianity and its Judea prophets and became the ultimate weapon in the hands of opportunist ruthless leaders. The faith of billions of people by itself it poses no problem at all, a global human right of the free born individual, but the USE of this faith in the hands of the canny leaders (Romans, Byzantines, Spanish, Anatolian and other "civilized" colons and slave merchants) till modern times should be reconsidered. Those leaders have realized the extreme power of that "tool", FAITH, and took advantage of it to its maximum. I find myself unable to understand as well, the evaluation of civilization and institutions through Christianity albeit my comprehension of great Thinkers who have tried to find in Christianity the resistance to the "barbarization" of the whole humanity (Dostoevsky, J.S.Bach or even Simone Veil etc.) but all those Thinkers had seen the peaceful dimension of Christianity, its LOVE. Of how much this last one is applied or even applicable... is still under consideration. A religion that prohibits laughing and dancing, slanders and disgusts the human body, cancels Olympic Games and demolished sculptures and texts of freedom and/or doubt, who is sole responsible of atrocious massive carnage, looks like exactly like any regime or leadership who tries to manipulate its subjects. Hence, I DEDUCT, such a faith is strange to any religious or ideological theorem, is hostile to the freedom of the body and the spirit i.e. free speech. One faith that is imposed to a people whose fundamental pillars had been Democracy and free will of faith, can never be liked and accepted. The subject brings afloat another big question. How come Historians all over the world have practically neglected to research and analyze the Hellenistic period? After the death of Alexander, king of Macedonia, known as the Great until the rise of the Roman empire and Christianity. But I am a retired cooking chef and a Noir novel writer wannabe, what do I know