“Such was the state of the city on the eve of Cicero’s consulship – a vortex of hunger, rumor, and anxiety; of crippled veterans and bankrupt farmers begging at every corner; of roistering bands of drunken young men terrorizing shopkeepers; of women from good families openly prostituting themselves outside the taverns; of sudden conflagrations, violent tempests, moonless nights and scavenging dogs; of fanatics, soothsayers, beggars, fights….Goods were scarce, food hoarded, shops empty. Even the moneylenders had stopped making loans.”

Book Review:

Review by Lynn Harnett (MAY 28, 2010)

Spanning five years, Harris’ second crisis-driven installment in the life of Cicero (after Imperium — both can be read on their own) begins in 63 BC as Cicero is elected consul of Rome and finds himself caught between two factions scheming for power, the patricians and the populists. Tiro, his slave and loyal secretary, continues to chronicle his master’s exploits as powerful forces range against him, including the wily and ruthless Gaius Julius Caesar.

“Pompey was still away commanding the legions in the East, and in his absence an uneasy, shifting mood swirled around the streets like river fog, giving everyone the jitters. There was a sense that some huge event was impending but no clear idea what it might be. The new tribunes were said to be working with Caesar and Crassus on a vast and secret scheme for giving away public land to the urban poor. Cicero had tried to find out more about it but had been rebuffed.”

The body of a disemboweled slave boy is discovered two days before Cicero’s inauguration, a murder which proves to be a barbaric sacrifice by a bunch of conspiring noblemen, aligning themselves, ironically, with the populists.

Then a group of agitated patrician senators appears at Cicero’s door while he is preparing his inaugural speech. Though he at first does not take them seriously – “Like many rich old men they tended to regard the slightest personal inconvenience as proof of the end of the world” – it turns out the oldest and most befuddled of them has been charged with the thirty-six year old murder of a tribune, Saturninus, who had, at the time, been declared a public enemy by the Senate for the murder of a consular candidate.

“Catulus spat out his name as if it were poison. ‘Saturninus! What a rogue! Killing him wasn’t a crime – it was a public service.’ “ Catulus goes on to describe the events, which involved at least 30 of Rome’s finest. Saturninus and his men had been captured and jailed in the Senate House until trial. “But we didn’t trust them not to escape again, so we got up on the roof and tore off the tiles and pelted them. There was no hiding place. They ran to and fro squealing like rats in a ditch. By the time Saturninus stopped twitching, you could barely tell who he was.’ “

Caesar, leader of the populists, is behind the charges, though Cicero is mystified as to what he expects to gain. He will find out as the public trial unfolds before the masses as well as hundreds of citizen jurors. Not only will his finest oratory be called upon, but his wiliest strategic thinking.

And this is only the beginning. 63 BC was a tumultuous year for Rome with plots, counterplots and more plots, most of them bearing the crafty marks of Caesar’s unconventional thinking. Cicero requires all his wits and political ingenuity just to stay alive. The sympathetic view of his mild-mannered secretary probes behind the events to explore Cicero’s thinking as he forms unlikely alliances, performs daring feats of oratory, and proves himself much braver than he feels. Not that Cicero doesn’t have his faults, which come back to haunt him after his consulship is complete.

The political maneuvering, fast footwork and bloody reprisals make for suspenseful reading, while the sympathetic narration fleshes out Cicero, who usually gets short shrift compared to Caesar, who here comes across as reckless as he is quick-witted.

Readers interested in this pivotal period in Roman history may also be interested in Valerio Massimo Manfredi’s The Ides of March, translated from the Italian by Christine Fedderson, (Europa Editions, paperback) which chronicles a race against time as a loyal centurion learns of the plot to assassinate Caesar and rushes to Rome to stop it. I found it a bit dry, with stilted characters, but aficionados may forgive these faults for the historical atmosphere as the centurion races through the countryside, recalling past campaigns and wary of betrayal.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 46 readers
PUBLISHER:	Simon & Schuster; 1 edition (February 2, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Lynn Harnett
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Robert Harris
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More early Roman Empire (in Fiction):A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome by Alberto Angela Hadrian’s Wall by William Dietrich A Body in the Bathhouse by Lindsey Davis

Bibliography:

• Fatherland (1992)
• Enigma (1995)
• Archangel (1999)
• Pompeii (2003)
• The Ghost (2007)

Cicero Trilogy

• Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome (2006)
• Conspirata (2009; February 2010) (Released as Lustrum in UK in 2009)   

Nonfiction:

• A Higher Form of Killing: Secret Story of Gas and Germ Warfare (1982) (with Jeremy Paxman)
• Gotcha! The Government, the Media and the Falklands Crisis (193)
• The Making of Neil Kinnock (1984)
• Selling Hitler: Story of the Hitler Diaries (1986)
• Good and Faithful Servant: Unauthorized Biography of Bernard Ingham (1990)

Movies from books:

• Archangel (2005)
• The Ghost Writer (2010)

“Even if I knew all the languages on earth, the rhymes of the most subtle poet, the most moving harmonies, if I had the precise brushstroke of a painter, no word, no sound or color in this world would enable me to describe the light that suddenly enveloped me. I saw it, I perceived its fragrance and heard its harmony though I was dissolved in its sweet crown of fire: a light compared to which the sun would appear opaque and pale, a light that permeated soul and body, dissolving boundaries, and emanated happiness and love, peace and fulfillment.”

Book Review:

Review by Kirstin Merrihew (MAY 9, 2010)

Saint Cecilia is listed in the Catholic Mass’ Commemoration of the Dead. Her feast day is easy to remember because it is the same day President Kennedy was assassinated: November 22. She is the patron saint of musicians and Church music because she is said to have sung as she was dying. According to hagiography, she was a Roman noble woman who converted to Christianity toward the end of the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121-180 A.D.). An only child, she married a man, Valerian, who along with his brother preceded her in martyrdom for their mutually-held religion. Cecilia survived several attempted executions, but finally after lingering a few days, she, still young, passed into Church history. The verifiable information about Saint Cecilia’s life is quite sparse, and so a novelist has plenty of elbow room for embellishment. Linda Ferri’s Cecilia takes apt advantage of this opportunity for invention in the name of rounding out characters, time, and place.

This is a work of literary art that beautifully, poetically, expresses the insecurities, jealousies, astute observations, passions and changes that overcome this Roman girl both before and after her marriage. The novel follows traditional history by making Cecilia an only child for the very likely reason that other children had been born to her parents but had died either in childbirth or by the time they were five years old. Cecilia’s mother, Lucilla, suffers terrible grief at the loss of all her babies except Cecilia, and even an understanding, good husband and one child to love aren’t enough; she becomes an acolyte of Isis and spends her days and many nights participating in the elaborate feminine rituals in the goddess’ temple. From her, then, it would seem that Cecilia inherits a family trait for religious zealotry.

Her father, Paulus, is a deeply conscientious and sensitive man who is derailed from the healing arts into public office, as the Prefect of the Annona. And, for a time, as he admits at one point to his daughter, he allowed an ambition to rise higher make him into a liar, flatterer and betrayer. Yet, he has the introspective mettle to recognize that political ambitions cannot allow him to be true to himself or to help his ailing, obsessive, and perpetually mourning wife. From him, Cecilia has inherited an intellectual and and philosophical spark. Both her parents have contributed much to the type of person she becomes, yet, in Ferri’s version, neither of them will share her conversion (whether they did in reality is disputed by Church historians; some do believe that Cecilia adopted Christianity in great part because her parents were already believers).

Where Ferri’s tale most noticeably diverges from accepted tradition concerns Valerian. In Cecilia, the young girl who earlier begged her father to postpone arranged nuptials is eager for marriage once she sees this handsome young nobleman. But the two grow apart as he increasingly tends to political and business interests, and she sees in him a hard and avaricious heart growing colder toward her and others. This Valerian does not become a Christian. This Valerian wants nothing to do with a wife who would align herself with a foreign sect, give alms to the poor and worship Christ rather than the Roman pantheon of gods. Since Ferri presented Cecilia’s father (about whom so little is known) quite favorably, I wonder why she chose to change Valerian. If there was one thing about the book that disappointed me it was not being able to read about Cecilia and Valerian sharing the same dangerous faith.

However, perhaps Ferri thought she could make a stronger literary character of Cecilia if she was the only one in her family and circle of acquaintances who did convert. Yet, interestingly (and, actually, somewhat to my relief), the author also veered away from ending the book with a lurid description of how Cecilia supposedly perished. Instead, Ferri offers an alternative ending, or at least a delay of the Roman woman’s fate, by having Cecilia pray, “Lord, we must trust you with humility, accept your miracles: the dream you gave my father about my lifeless body, life that I wanted and that you wished to give me again.”

But perhaps it is we, the readers, who are being led down a merciful garden path when she adds, “Paradise is the lost garden. It is the garden.” Cecilia is a mystic, someone who has visions and who often dreams. She invites, no, challenges us to see where the line between reality and fantasy really lies. Not to mention that Cecilia, who lost many loved ones in her short life, seeks hope in the promise of eternal life (one of the reasons she is drawn to the Christians). Why shouldn’t her story read as though her life had continued, even if it hadn’t?

Cecilia is a saint from the beginning centuries of Christianity, but she, as with all who are canonized, was once a flawed flesh-and-blood person. She lived in a society where those who followed Christ were considered “atheists,” where those who would not renounce this new faith were tortured to death. In Ferri’s novel, newly-baptized Cecilia confesses her feelings of unworthiness. “Later I confided to Alexander that my faith is weak, that I was unable to speak to Jesus, and that I didn’t even have the power to make myself heard by my best friend.” Although Cecilia’s flash-present, flash-back structure does leave a few holes and can be confusing if the reader isn’t alert, it provides a fascinating look into the fragile but determined psyche of a young woman who first sought spiritual and soul fulfillment in her own Roman gods. But when something frightening happens, she is awakened as never before. She feels as though”…every nerve, every drop of blood brought to life by all that light — I a quivering little flame that rose, above the roof, toward the sky.”

This novel renders for the reader a portrait of love burning in a girl who searches for a way to let it shine its brightest. Her mother looked to religious rites to quench her sorrows, but Cecilia embraced a different God to release the light inside.

Cecilia is highly recommended, especially to those who look for and cherish novels about Imperial Rome, the early Christian church, and the mystical mind.

(Translated from Italian by Ann Goldstein.)

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 3 readers
PUBLISHER:	Europa Editions (April 27, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Kirstin Merrihew
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	Not Yet
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Linda Ferri
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt (none found!)
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome by  Alberto Angela The Marcus Didius Falco Series by Lindsey Davis

Translated Bibliography:

• Enchantments (2005)
• Cecilia (April 2010)

“The Thracian keeps running back and forth in front of his opponent, stopping and swaying his body, squatting like a cat. Then he suddenly springs forward, jumping onto the ‘wall’ of the murmillo’s shield, and tries to strike him on the neck, unleashing a terrible right hook. The murmillo ducks and the blow glances off the top of his helmet, emitting a dry, metallic clang. The crowd explodes, chanting hoc habet, hoc habet (‘now he strikes him, now he strikes him’).”

Book Review:

Reviewed by Kirstin Merrihew (JUN 21, 2009)

What would A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome be if we didn’t slip in with the throngs to see the free, first-century amphitheater “entertainment” ourselves? We do, and we wait for the brutal show to begin. “And finally there they are: the gladiators. The crowd is delirious. You have to cover your ears to shield them from the noise. For a second, you have the impression that even the Colosseum could collapse under the shouting and beating feet of tens of thousands of spectators….But it is horrifying to think that all this has been achieved solely for the purpose of producing spectacles of death.”

As we know, instead of violent movies and video games, Imperial Rome settled for real violence — their “reality shows.” Bloody executions, ordered by the State and often administered at the teeth and claws of ferocious animals, were scheduled earlier in the day. Lavish mortal hand-to-hand combat scenarios, sponsored by wealthy patricians who hoped to gain popular political support, were an inextricable later part of a typical day in the then largest city in the world.

But knowing isn’t the same as “being there.” Alberto Angela, author and TV science show host, gets us a ticket with a seat number so we can witness, amongst other matches, a mortal struggle between a murmillo (a “fish man”) and a retiarius. “This couple symbolically represents the fisherman, equipped with a net, trident, and dagger, and the fish…which hides among the rocks, ready to unleash its lethal bite (exactly like this type of gladiator, hiding behind his enormous shield).” Angela neglects nothing of the atmosphere; the Colosseum lives and breathes with the agonies in the arena and the audience’s chants of “now he strikes him, how he strikes him.” And as we watch the fray, Angela also teaches us vocabulary and showers us with facts galore. He is our guide, our instructor in this deadly place.

Fortunately for the less bloodthirsty readers, this day tour introduces (or reacquaints) us with many others aspects of Roman life. After a chapter to orient us in the 115 CE Trajan Empire, Angela confidently leads us through the hours beginning with a predawn survey of the dark, silent streets of Rome. Then he proceeds to show us the home of an upper class family whose denizens are awakening, We find out how togas are wrapped around the human figure, the grooming secrets for both men and women, and what they eat for breakfast. As the day begins in public, we “watch” a barber scrape men’s faces and then wander out to see the rest of the shops opening. We pass by a temple, and then observe games in the street and school being held outdoors. We go inside an apartment building housing common people and see how their lives contrast with those of the privileged we viewed earlier. There is a cattle auction at the Boarian Forum, and a slave market. Then we arrive at the Roman Forum and catch a brief glimpse of the Senate. It isn’t lunchtime yet, but the Colosseum is already in business, and we will hear about or see it a few times today. Meanwhile, a visit to a public restroom demystifies how the Romans coped in the pre-toilet paper era. We catch sight of the historian Tacitus in a bookshop that also serves as a publishing house. After fortifying ourselves with a light repast but refusing some of the other “wares” (aka, sex) for sale in a small food bar, we set off, along with many others, to the baths and cleanse ourselves. Then, after the adrenaline rush of the gladiatorial games, we follow the litters of a domus and his wife as they go to a banquet We watch them recline and consume such Roman delicacies as “flamingo tongues, parrotfish livers, peacock and pheasant brains, and ‘milk’ from a moray eel.” These banquets can last for hours, but often Romans will be home before dark to avoid street robbers. Finally before we bid Rome good-bye, there is some information about Roman sexual practices, but our voyeurism doesn’t go too far.

A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome produces a remarkably illustrative overview of how Romans of that time lived. Angela has succeeded at delivering a large quantity of information with an affable, inviting style (he even patriotically and endearingly interjects that spaghetti is in fact an Italian invention; the Chinese created their own version independently, according to him). As he declares in his introduction, “But actually there is a trick to acquiring a real understanding of the everyday life in these sites. Pay attention to the details: the signs of wear on the steps, the graffiti inscribed on the plaster walls (Pompeii is full of them), the grooves left in the pavement by cart wheels or the scratches on the marble doorsill of a house, caused by the movement of the (long since vanished) front door.” He is a stickler for incorporating such observations into his tour.

Gregory Conti has translated Angela’s original Italian work into English for Europa Editions. Occasionally an oddity comes up in the specific words chosen. For instance, the use of “couple” when referring to the pair of gladiators. Whether this and a few examples are the result of literal translations of Angela’s own malapropisms or Conti’s “mistranslations” isn’t clear when relying only on the English text. In any case, only a few noticeable phrases or words gather under this umbrella. Overwhelmingly, the language conveys crisply and clearly the ancient Roman environment.

And the instructive illustrations, drawn by Luca Tarlazzi and strategically scattered throughout the book, very helpfully augment various lessons: for example, there is a chart of Roman hand signals used for counting, mainly in business transactions. Although some of the particulars have been lost in the mists of history, supposedly Romans could count to 10,000 using these signs — using their hands something like an abacus.

It is the many facts like this that particularly suggest this book as a fine introduction to ancient Rome for young people. Perhaps some schools will choose to use it as a textbook. However, that isn’t to imply that A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome isn’t for adult edification. Anyone who has enjoyed fictional jaunts to Rome through historical novels by authors such as Colleen McCullough, Steven Saylor, Lindsey Davis, or Robert Harris will likely be fascinated with the chance to tag along on Angela’s tour. I thoroughly enjoyed it. And it is also a very useful supplement to heavier histories of Rome. As others read this book, perhaps they will think as I did, of one thing that might have further strengthened this offering: even more detail about, for example, the actual building of some of the wonders of Roman architecture. Or, more about the inner workings of the Senate or a court trial. But this volume is close to four hundred pages, so if we want further study materials, we can always consult Angela’s bibliography and other reference works.

Now, in Angela’s words, “And so concludes our day in the life of imperial Rome. An ordinary day, almost two thousand years ago.” We’ve received a gift — a chance to peek into many magnificent spaces and some rather creepy crevices. The last chapter closes at midnight: “As we walk down the street, there is an unreal silence. A silence broken only by the sound of the water flowing in a neighborhood fountain, just a few yards away. The sound of the falling water is our only company.”

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 13 readers
PUBLISHER:	Europa Editions (May 26, 2009)
REVIEWER:	Kirstin Merrihew
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	Not Yet
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Alberto Angela; Gregory Conti translator
EXTRAS:	———
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More early Roman Empire (in Fiction):The Accusers by Lindsey Davis Alexandria by Lindsey Davis Hadrian’s Wall by William Dietrich

Bibliography:

• Sharks (1997)
• Life-sized Museums (1988)
• The Extraordinary Story of a Growing Life (1993)
• Voyage in the Cosmos (1998)
• A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome: Daily Life, Mysteries, and Curiosities (May 2009)

“So in there,” I mused, “is all the knowledge in the world?”

“You bet, Falco.”

“The greatest scholars alive today gather to read there?”

“Best minds in the world.”

“Plus a dead man.”

“At least one,'”answered Aulus, with a grin. “Half the readers look embalmed. There could be other stiffs that nobody has noticed yet.”

Book Review:

Reviewed by Kirstin Merrihew (MAY 12, 2009)

Marcus Didius Falco’s eighteen previous escapades took him, when he wasn’t at home in Rome, to Naples, Capua, and outward to Greece, Spain, Germany, and Britain. This time, in the Spring of A.D. 77,  he and his family arrive in Egypt to see the Pyramids at Giza. But first they sail from Rhodes to the city Alexander the Great built, where they’ll stay a while with Falco’s Uncle Fulvius. Alexandria beckons them with the huge landmark, the famed Lighthouse. To welcome their guests, Fulvius and his partner throw a dinner party, and among the invited is the Librarian of the Great Library of the Alexandria Museion, a man who seems burdened. Not long afterward, Falco is summoned to a mysterious locked-door death at the library, and soon he is appointed by the Prefect to investigate.

In the course of 338 pages, he and his lovely wife, Helena Justina, meet the anticipated parade of possible suspects and uncover various shenanigans that might be motives for murder. As Falco tries to unravel the political jockeying and the shady dealings at the Museion and in Alexandria at large, he becomes acquainted with Philadelphion, the Zoo Keeper; Nicanor, a lawyer; Zenon, Chief Astronomer; Diogenes, an enterprising businessman; Katutis, a street watcher; and Roxana, a women desired by many. Falco, his wife, their two young “poppets,” and their 17-year-old adopted daughter also have encounters with a few choice animals, including a gnu, a python, and Sobek, a very large Nile crocodile.

The good private “informer” must, once again conduct interviews, gather evidence, and try to sort through who did what to whom. Meanwhile Falco’s Pa surprises them, library scrolls disappear, one of the zoo animals escapes, and the body count rises. And, of course, Falco doesn’t have to settle for merely spying the Lighthouse across thick fog from a passing vessel. He gets to see it up close and personal — in a very impromptu, very heart-pounding way. Uh, perhaps he would have preferred a sedate, organized group tour….

As always, author Lindsey Davis creates the Vespasian Roman Empire which Falco serves using faithful and vividly described historical research. Then she overlays that with a decidedly modern twist on character behavior and psychology. Hers are people with 21st century speech and outlooks. They, in turn, are packaged in a conventional mystery structure to which we are accustomed. Then everything is bonded with doses of satire, irony, and archness. Falco’s observations about his Empire might as easily be ones we could make about our society, our institutions, our mores. He straddles the time continuum, in a sense, and he does it with endearing aplomb.

Alexandria is a better adventure than the previous volume in the Falco series, Saturnalia, methinks. Perhaps it is the exotic locale, and the renowned Library and Lighthouse (one of the Seven Wonders of the World) brought expertly into existence again. The book’s helpful map of this old city includes a note that the coastline and the position of the monuments had to be conjectured. Earthquakes destroyed much of ancient Alexandria and silt from the Nile altered the coastline. But Davis offers the reader a delightful chance to plausibly “see” what the city was like, geographically and atmospherically, back then.

This mystery itself involved me more too. Extensive numbers of wily characters and their multiplicitous intrigues can be confusing and wearying in the mystery genre at large and, sometimes, even in those centering on Falco. However, rare was the page where my attention drifted in Alexandria. The story gallops along, making a pleasant mockery of chapter endings as good places to rest the eyes and jab in a bookmark. Cliffhangers and tantalizing hints demand another page…and another.

I’m already looking forward to the next in the Falco series which reportedly will be entitled Nemesis. In the meantime, homage to Alexandria.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 3 readers
PUBLISHER:	Minotaur Books (May 12, 2009)
REVIEWER:	Kirstin Merrihew
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Lindsey Davis
EXTRAS:	None
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More Didius Falco books reviewed…

Bibliography:

Marcus Didius Falco mysteries:

• The Silver Pigs (1989)
• Shadows in Bronze (1990)
• Venus in Copper (1991)
• The Iron Hand of Mars (1992)
• Poseidon’s Gold (1993)
• Last Act in Palmyra (1994)
• Time to Depart (1995)
• A Dying Light in Corduba (1998)
• Two for the Lions (1999)
• Three Hands in the Fountain (1999)
• One Virgin Too Many (2000)
• Ode to a Banker (2001)
• A Body in the Bathhouse (2002)
• The Jupiter Myth (2003)
• The Accusers (2004)
• Scandal Takes a Holiday (2004)
• See Delphi and Die (2005; 2006 in US)
• Saturnalia 2007)
• Alexandria (2009)
• Nemesis (2010)

Flavia Albia Mysteries:

• The Ides of April ( 2013)
• Enemies at Home (June 2014)

Other novels:

• The Course of Honor (1998)