Two For The Lions

This is the tenth novel in the mystery series featuring Marcus Didius Falco, an informer and sleuth in Rome at the time of Vespasian. A series of books that have become hugely popular, so much so that the author is now at the forefront of historical mystery writers. It was probably a stroke of genius on her part to have novels that are extremely well researched and contain all the elements that would be and should be found in the Roman world of circa AD70, but to have a lead character who has the vocabulary of a present day New York cop. In this the tenth novel Falco and Helena Justina now have a baby girl (Three Hands in the Fountain) It is AD73 and the Emperor Vespasian has come up with a good idea for making money. Why not hold a census, after all if the senate know who everyone is and where they live it will be much easier to impose taxes on them. Falco and Partner become Censors. Well someone has to do it. There job is to investigate fraudulent claims, a messy, but lucrative business. Unfortunately for Falco his `partner' is none other than Anacrites, a no good low life and palace spy. While investigating the people who run the gladiator schools and wild beast shows, Falco is involved in the mysterious death of a lion, an escaped leopard and a dead gladiator. There is much rivalry among the men who organise the vast games in Rome. It is a cut throat world where life is cheap and killing a man comes as second nature to many of the people involved in Falco's latest case.

I gobble up each Falco book when it comes out. Not only is he a clever Roman sleuth; but I like to read each installment of his domestic life. How your average every-day private Roman eye has to cope with death, taxes, thugs, murderers, bureaucracy, a conniving rival, a cheat of a father, a domineering mother, a high-born love and a baby daughter and still earn the daily sesterces make interesting reading. I wish however that Falco and his friend Petro can be friends again; because they are such a team.

To get the worst out of the way first the only thing that wasn't quite right with this latest instalment of Marcus Didius Falco was the hero's current relationship with Petronius Longinus. The preceding novel did not leave us with the impression of bitterness that 'Two For The Lions' conveys. Aside from that, what can I say? Superb characterization, imaginative plots and plenty of light humour! The easy reading of all Lindsey Davis' novels makes each trip into the Roman world of seedy back-door politics and informers a delight. The development of Anacrites and the relationship between Helena Justina and Marcus Didius is entirely credible and always amusing. Long may the series continue.............

Davis finds yet another seam on Rome's underbelly to pick open as Falco investigates the death of a moonlighting Circus lion, and other possibly related oddities. What I love about these books is the attention to detail that the author uses to submerge you in Falco's world; it's like what Mary Renault did with ancient Greece. Renault and Davis also share the gift of being able to get into the skin of their male central characters.Unlike Renault, Davis seems equally interested in her female characters, and Two For the Lions has some good ones, as well as the further development of everyone's favourite pest, Anacrites. Good mystery, good history. I wish my copy wasn't sitting on the kitchen table back in England...