The writing was fine, the historical setting interesting, but there wasn't enough mystery in this 'mystery' and I bailed.

I loved this book! Our hero, Medicus, a doctor in ancient Roman-occupied Britain, is a fascinating and totally lovable guy. The book jacket compares him to young Harrison Ford, and I think that's perfect--surly, oblivious to his own charm, professional, and totally adorable underneath a mildly prickly exterior. The writing somehow makes it easy to imagine living in Deva, Brittania (an area in a period I know nothing about) and all the characters are well-written and very engaging. I am really looking forward to the sequel, Terra Incognita, and any further adventures of Gaius Petreius Ruso.

Roman mystery set in Chester featuring a doctor attached to the occupying 20th legion, this is very much in the tradition of Lindsay Davis' Falco series and that is fine with me. I found it amusing and witty with well drawn characters and a good story line. I look forward to reading more in the series.

Entertaining mystery set in Roman Britain. While consistent with what is known about Roman Britain, there was not much description of place or activities. Romans also seemed to speak with a British ‘accent’.

Actually 2.5 .

It took me forever to finish it and I wouldn't read the other books in the series even if I was paid to do so!

The plot on the back cover was promising and together the length of the book ( 400 pages ) made one think of a masterfully conceived mystery full of historical details.


___ PLOT ___ (Britannia, the era in which Hadrian had just succeeded Trajan as emperor, the writer does not say it, but we are in 117 AD)
A serial killer is on the loose in Roman-occupied Britain, and Gaius Petreius Ruso is out to catch him... if he isn't killed first.

The Gods are not smiling on army doctor Gaius Petreius Ruso in his new posting in Britannia. He has vast debts, long shifts, and an overbearing hospital administrator to deal with . . .

After the news of a woman's body fished from the river and after having saved a slave from the mistreatment of her master, Ruso, the doctor of the XX Legion finds himself, despite himself, wanting to shed light on the events.

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This could have been an enjoyable read of a cozy mystery (or an enjoyable historical fiction to read, if well detailed historically speaking) set among the Roman legionaries in Britain.
Instead it's a cozy mystery (nothing bad, I love them, but at least they're shorter, quicker reads) stretched out with "thin air", no historical details except the name of the emperor at the time and maybe the name of the place (Deva), where the investigation is only a couple of questions up to 75% of the book, where the author inserts any idle talk except to focus on the mystery.

I think : if you don't know how to write a mystery, write something else, if you don't know historical notions and if you don't do some research before writing a historical novel, then write a contemporary one!

I really liked the main character, the Medicus Ruso and his friend/colleague Valens, unfortunately the story is a continuous digression on useless details that serve no purpose in the story; repetitive speeches about our "hero's" past, entire chapters in which the main character repeats the same question and the narrator continues to say that it is not answered; a modern dialogue among Romans that goes beyond the limit of the acceptable, catapulting the reader onto a 1920s cozy mystery book and sometimes on a Victorian movie set, certainly jarring in the Roman Empire era!


---> WHAT I LIKED ABOUT THE MAIN CHARACTER :

- Gaius Petreius Ruso : I liked him as a character, because he is not the classic hero of flawless books, he is a good person, full of troubles to solve who would like to live in peace without finding more problems.
The beautiful part of his way of being is that he cannot ignore his conscience, his profession is what it should be even nowadays: a vocation and a mission.
He knows perfectly well that by meddling in other people's business he will find trouble, he doesn't want to do that, but his good heart doesn't allow him to ignore all the bad things around him.
While other negative reviews have described him as boring, I say that he is not at all: it's true, the brilliant way he behaves in society and the always ready joke belong to his nice and handsome colleague Valens, but Ruso, in his way of acting calm, serious and sometimes gruff, he throws his ironic jokes (or thinks them) with great mastery.
This cute character is the only reason I rounded the rating up to 3 stars.


---> WHAT I DIDEN'T LIKE ABOUT WRITING STYLE, DIALOGUES and MYSTERY :

- WRITING STYLE : I usually like descriptions that give an idea of ​​the place, the time in which the story takes place, the type of life the characters lead and their way of being.
I know that this is the first book in a series and I also know that the writer had never been a writer before, but the publisher and other people should have realized that it's like too much of a good thing ( How do they say ? "Less is more" !!! )

Throughout the first half of the book the author continues to repeat about Ruso's debts inherited from his father, every 3 sentences the author inserts Ruso's thoughts on what his hateful ex-wife would have said.
In each small scene, the narrator continually talks about visual details (such as a badly decorated wall, mice in the house, shouting and shouting in the street) which are too many, not relevant to the mystery and lengthen the same scene by pages and pages... they become not only useless but also irritating.
This was the trick I used at school, when the essay I wrote was too short and I didn't know what else to write.
Dear author, have you done the same thing? Disappointing and annoying !


- DIALOGUES : It is clear that a novel set in ancient times, to be read easily by readers, must have a non-archaic writing style and dialogues close to today's way of speaking.
But now I ask : since when did Roman legionaries talk to each other using words like "chaps" and expressions like "Right-oh" (British slang that I only found in modern cozy mysteries set around the 1920s)???

And the following sentence: "Hey, mister! Got a penny, mister?"
... A PENNY ???????????????
Since when did the Romans have pennies in their coins??
I won't add any further comments on the matter, better not.

I accept the modernity of language which makes reading the book lighter and more entertaining for me, but I think that an author must set limits and check whether the type of language is suitable for that era and that people or if it clashes with the whole context, just like a jarring note!

Another thing that seemed out of place to me was the continuous knocking on the door and opening the doorknob, in one scene the slave comes back with her candle in her hand, knocks on the door and stops on the threshold. Well, it looks to me like a scene with a maid in the Victorian era.
The first historical evidence of the use of actual candles dates back to the 8th century ( Wikipedia ) and I have never seen films and TV series set in the first century AD where people walked around with candles in their hands... they are usually seen torches on the walls and people walking around with torches.


- MYSTERY AND INVESTIGATION: Almost non-existent.
We have the first suspicious death at the beginning of the book, but even if Ruso is immediately hesitant about the fact that it is an accident and puts forward the hypothesis that it is murder, in fact he only asks a couple of questions around and the whole story is a continuation of patient visits by Ruso. Except for one, none of these patients are relevant to the mystery, they are just part of Ruso's daily life.
Well it's nice to know the character's daily routine, but here we have his life described minute by minute, day after day, from breakfast, to the nights, from all chats with his friend, to the questions he asks himself on his mind and to a thousand other silly things. ..
A book full of thin air!
Only 70% of the way through the story do we have more questions and only in the last chapters do we see a little movement in the story and then the solution (nothing sensational).

- HISTORICAL DETAILS : Same thing as before, i.e. almost non-existent.
Just a mention of the death of Emperor Trajan and the succession of Hadrian.
There is also mention of the Roman baths (that is, the slaves of a bar/brothel go to the baths, nothing else).

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Maybe the following books in the series are better documented, but I think the writing style remains the same and it's not for me, I absolutely don't feel like going on with the series.
I will try other mysteries with the same setting, but by other authors.
So far, the truly well-documented and compelling historical fictions are those of the Italian writer Valerio Massimo Manfredi.

Thank you for reading my opinion and please forgive my English, it's not my native language, I am from Italy (and I live in a town founded by Romans! :-) )

Curmudgeon & army doctor Gaius Ruso has just been stationed in Brittania, the back of beyond & far from civilization. His living quarters are filthy, his finances poor, the hospital administrator a petty tyrant, and his finances are stretched further when he rescues an injured young woman slave from an abusive owner. When young women from the local bar aka whorehouse start turning up murdered, he is reluctantly drawn by the locals into investigating it. In the meantime he grows attached to the intelligent & defiant slave woman, and she too becomes entangled in the mystery.

I read along with a group on the knitting site Ravelry. I found the book an unexpected enjoyable read. More so the slowly developing story about the main character (Ruso) and his slave, Tilla - than the "mystery" which was not compelling alone to hold my attention. But I like grumpy Ruso and will eventually read more in the series.

It was my first book set in Roman ruled Britton. The dialog seemed surprisingly modern, so that was a bit jarring. I kept picturing modern structures and buildings, because of the description - but then would realize the setting was during the Roman empire. Maybe it was all accurate, but if so there was a lot of modern infrastructure that didn't seem to be around in England several hundred years later during the Tudor and Elizabethan eras, which I've read more about.

A doctor accidently gets involved in a complicated mystery of murder, sex trafficking, and financial shenanigans because he, good diagnostician that he is, just can't stop noticing things or asking questions.

Set in Roman-Britain during the transition from Emperor Trajan to Emperor Harridan we get a in-your-face warts-and-all look at what "civilization" means in terms of both indoor heated plumbing and kidnapping for the purpose of a lifetime of sexual slavery.

Downie tells a good British amateur detective mystery - but she doesn't hold back punches when it comes to uncomfortable parallels to today with far too many people willing to overlook those in pain or throw their hands up and let "the system" take its course. She admits in her author's note she did her best to research the time period and had to fill in the many, many holes in the historical record with her imagination, but she does an excellent job making the time and place come alive and feel extremely relatable.

⭐️ 3.5 stars ⭐️

A detective story set in Roman Britannia, what a treat! I was really happy when I got this reading suggestion and now I cannot wait to read the other books in the series. To be clear: not everything is historically accurate and the writer explains that at the end of the book. I was actually wondering if some elements were just "poetic license" and it turned out they were. However, that takes away nothing at all from the story, that is funny and heartwarming, but also very modern. Human trafficking, the arrogance of the powerful, colonialism, financial problems, women's abuse.. these are all contemporary topics and you will find all of them in this work, where the world is seen through the eyes of a generous doctor who is unable to say 'no'.
The characters are overall very believable, especially Priscus, the Roman bureaucrat who counts every sheet and stripe of bandage in the hospital. Romans were famously accurate and precise accountants - luckily for us, I must say.
Well, get a nice cup of tea or coffee, sit down in your favorite and couch and enjoy.

The novel is an ideal holiday read. Set in Britain under Roman rule, it tells a story of a Roman doctor-cum-detective character, Gaius Ruso. Quite enjoyable if you are in the mood for some light reading.

I finished this late last week - it seemed slow to start, but it was a good read. I just had a hard time getting into it, as I'm currently reading a few books. I saw the sequel at the library, and the comments on the back about the first book made me want to give it a try - I'm glad I did. Interesting characters and great dialogue, LOL at times. I realize from the author's afterword that not much is known about Roman Britain, so I feel it's a bit unfair to criticize her historical accuracy as some reviewers did on Amazon. Having said that, since I know very little about the period myself, I found it very interesting to read about how much the Roman medicus' were able to do for their patients. I definitely saw the Hawkeye/Trapper John-type give-and-take between Ruso and his fellow doctor and housemate Valens. Albanus, Ruso's scribe, reminded me more than a little of Radar! It was a fun read, and once I REALLY got into it, about a third of the way through, I was glad I stuck with it. Ruso is a very appealing hero, and I will definitely give "Terra Incognita", the second in the series, a try.