Looking forward to the next in the series!

Medicus and the Disappearing Dancing Girls is the first of a series of novels that follows the misfortunes of a Roman Army Medical Officer, Gaius Petreius Ruso, after his posting from the warm climes of North Africa to the dreary grey drizzle of Deva (pron. Dewa); that's modern day Chester.

Ruso is down on his luck and doesn't own much more than a few mounting debts. As well as trying to support his own life in the British garrison town, he is obliged to send funds home to his brother in southern Gaul lest his family find themselves destitute and homeless.

His medical colleague at the garrison hospital, who shares his squalid house with Ruso, takes life as it comes and has a wicked sense of humour, and is no help at all. Consequently, Ruso has very little support from anyone as he tries to traverse his difficult life. Almost by accident he finds himself burdened with further unmanageable debts, becomes the reluctant owner of an injured slave, Tilla, and is in continual conflict with the hospital administrator and many of the local Britons.

There are many reflections of twenty-first century society in this book, ranging from the financial and administrative pressures on the health service to the very serious issue of the white slave trade. I am sure that these parallels are deliberately drawn by the author to provoke the reader into thoughts beyond the main storyline.

Ruso becomes an unwilling detective, trying to track down the truth behind the disappearance of several dancing girls from the local brothel and bar. The story moves at a leisurely pace and, in the main, insinuates the brutality of the age rather than going into explicit detail.

I have always been a big fan of historical novels as, with conversations and images, they bring history to life around those dry, boring dates and names that I had to learn in the school classroom. Medicus does this for me and, at the same time, introduces some interesting characters whom I very much look forward to meeting again as the series unfolds. I strongly suspect that Ruso's slave, Tilla, will become his driving force.

This is an excellent detective story, and the links between Roman Britain and Modern Britain are particularly pleasing. I would recommend Medicus to anyone who enjoys a good historical fiction.

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.

The story itself was nothing special, just a typical pop mystery, but I enjoyed the setting of Brittania during the reign of Trajan/Hadrian in the Roman Empire - will definitely check more of these books out.

A fun fast read: I like a good mystery now and then, and of course it doesn't hurt if the book in question happens to be set in Ancient Roman times. Roman Britain, in fact, during the relatively pleasant and peaceful reign of Hadrian. But enough history:

The main attraction here is Gaius Petreius Ruso, divorcée, army medical doctor (medicus, medical... I think I get it!) and reluctant protagonist of this here tale. He is such a stick in the mud! A nice guy at heart but, trouble is, everything seems to be going wrong... his wife left him a few years ago but he still hasn't gotten over it, he's overworked and still lives in squalor... he lives in Britain... and worst of all, he somehow manages to get himself wrapped up in the murders of two prostitutes from a nearby brothel.

Ruso is the classic put-upon patriarch, an old and well-worn character trope which has been a staple of comedies at least as far back as the Romans themselves, and which found success long into the twentieth century (I can name three perfect examples: George Banks from Mary Poppins, Mr. Alonzo Smith from Meet Me in St. Louis, and "father" from E.L. Doctorow's 20s-set historical novel Ragtime). Secure in his faith of his de jure position of authority as a man -- over women, children, slaves, and anything else that moves -- the impotent patriarch is at the same time quite shocked when his de facto influence falls way, way short of his expectations, usually to comic effect. The modern approach of this kind of character is ambivalence at best: glad to see a few cracks in the patriarchal stranglehold, yet full of sad feelings regarding the mere existence, past and present, of that stranglehold. For my part, I say it's good to be back in the days when men were men, slaves were slaves, and cataract surgery was scary as all get out.

Ruso's the main attraction, of course, but a decent supporting cast surrounds him. There's Tilla, the dying native girl Ruso reluctantly buys off some random guy dragging her home -- a real fixer upper. She turns out to be a looker, though, so I guess that counterbalances the whole "sorry I got you wrapped in a ridiculous mystery" thing. Then there's Valens, the handsome, funny, socially at ease fellow doctor and roommate. And Priscus, the balding, bureaucratic administrator of the hospital -- who can really handle himself with a kitchen knife. There are others of course, but they're all women and/or slaves, so you can understand my silence.

This book, it is Roman enough for my tastes -- and modern enough too. "This book could be set at any time period, any place." Well yeah, granted, jokes about British cuisine never go out of style, but surely the Romans have a character all their own! Surely... lead water pipes, slaves, and a life expectancy of thirty-five -- isn't that enough? Ruth Downie, she does a pretty good job. Yeah, yeah, she's not Robert Graves, but then she's not Robert Fagles either (impressed yet? okay, how about Robert Redford? Robbie Williams? Robin Williams? Okay, I better stop...) Like I said, the book is Roman enough -- enough to get me in the mood without tugging and tearing at my poor little overworked brain cells. This delicate balance saw me through to the end of the book, allowing me to overlook the slow start, the just average writing style, and the really rather average mystery tale itself; to shrug my shoulders and go along for the ride. My little local library, for some reason, has every book in this series so maybe I'll go back for a double or even triple dip. *shrug* "When in Deva..." as they say.

I was hoping for a fun murder mystery set in Roman occupied Britannia, full of cool insights into a Briton culture clashing with a roman culture, or at least a fun plot, but this book was really small in scope, kind of boring, and had some super weird (bad weird, not good weird) plot points involving the slavery of the British.

#1 in the Gaius Petreius Ruso historical mystery series set in Roman-occupied Britannia. Ruso, a recently-divorced doctor who has moved from his family home in Gaul to an army outpost in Deva (modern-day Chester, UK) and stumbles immediately into a mystery, with the dead, naked body of a young woman brought into his surgery. Most of her red hair has been lopped off, and he's curious not only about her, but about her killer. When he discovers that she was a "dancing girl" from one of the local bars and that another woman who worked there has disappeared, and no one is investigating, he takes an unofficial but widely-known interest and begins nosing around.

All this while attempting to deal with long hours in his duties as a doctor/surgeon, a slave girl he purchased who has a bit of an attitude problem and is unable to do anything because of injuries that need healing, a roommate (in a rather run-down, filthy home) who is vying with him for the position of Chief Medical Officer--a job Ruso badly needs so he can send his family money and avoid their farm going under, and a host of other little problems. Poor Ruso! He's made the mistake of being someone who cares and seems to get slapped down for it time and again in a series of unfortunate events.

The story is written in an engaging style with plenty of wry humor and well-developed characters. The only regret I have is that this book sat on my TBR stacks for way too long--but I am glad to have the next two waiting for me. Excellent! A+

Upon examining a drowned corpse, military Medicus (doctor), Gaius Petrius Ruso, finds himself reluctantly investigating the deaths of young women who are employed at the local bordello. On his way home from the crime scene, he ends up rescuing and ultimately purchasing Tilla, an injured slave from her abusive master. As his finances quickly become depleted, and the tyrannical administrator returns to rule the hospital with an iron fist, Ruso must uncover the shady dealings that have been going on in an attempt to simplify his overly complicated life.

Despite the seriousness of the underlying themes (prostitution, the human slave trade), Downie’s debut novel can be considered a cozy (a mystery without graphic violence and sex that involves an amateur detective). She addresses these difficult topics with humor and wittiness without glossing over the real issues.

The best word to describe Medicus is amusing…not good, not great, but very amusing. This is the sole quality that kept me somewhat engaged until the climax of the story. The protagonist finds himself in these droll and unpredictable circumstances and the reader becomes privy to his inner thoughts on the matter. The supporting characters are all quite the personalities, and after a very slow start, this book did redeem itself in a big way.

I read, intermittently, historical fiction, and I also read, intermittently, mystery books. While some of my very favorite authors cross both genres (Laurie R. King being the premier examples), I am fussy about both, and so tend to be leery of historical mysteries—most fail to work for me, as mysteries or as historical novels. This book is one of those rare examples of an excellent historical novel wrapped around an excellent mystery. It is fairly unconventional as a mystery, as it never actually settles into being a mystery. Gaius Petreius Ruso is a garrison doctor in Roman-occupied Britain, and has no interest whatever in conducting investigations. Mysterious bodies, however, end up coming his way, and he ends up asking the occasional question in spite of himself. While both the plot and the historical setting are convincing, what sets this book apart is the tone—it is wry and witty, without ever straying into anachronism. It ends up reading rather like M*A*S*H as set in Roman Britain, and I enjoyed it thoroughly and can’t wait to read the sequel.

I thought this was a gem when I tripped over in on Amazon, and I still do! Such a unique story and great character development. A mystery, a love story, a historical novel, all wrapped up into one. A divorced Roman doctor who ends up serving in a hospital in faraway British colony, having to deal with the hostile local Celts. Ms. Downie bring Ancient Roman Britain to life.

My sister has put me onto this series, and I will be reading them all. I have no idea if the actual mysteries are good --- the one at the heart of the first book isn't --- but the setting is genius and the characters are well-drawn. It would make a wonderful series for PBS Mystery, and that is high praise from me. Downie has created the world of early second century Britain. The central characters are Romans stationed at the outpost of Deva, chiefly a doctor named Ruso and his slave, Tilla. It has been a long dry spell since I have read an historical novel that made me feel as though I were actually in a different time and place, but Downie pulls it off so well that I didn't even care that the "mystery" didn't make a whole lot of sense. I wanted to know what happened to Ruso, Tilla, Chloe, Valens --- honestly, this was a good read.

From the first pages of Medicus I was intrigued with the protagonist, Gaius Petreius Ruso, an Ancient Roman military doctor, and by his world. A Roman military doctor's job feels timeless in the hands of the author: soldiers' injuries from training, fights, and dangerous recreation; the local services surrounding the camp; under-staffing and less than perfectly-trained hospital personnel.

The element that stands out from the start of the book, however, is the element that should stand out in all novels set in the Ancient Roman Empire: slavery. The author of Medicus does not shy away from slavery; she actually makes it central to the story.

Medicus's subtitle is A Novel of the Roman Empire. It is not billed as a An Ancient Roman Mystery Novel because it is not one. Medicus is similar to Rosemary Sutcliff's classic Eagle of the Ninth in the way the dramatic story is supported by an underlying mystery. The principle story of both books is how the diverse cultures, Roman and Celtic, co-existed and eventually married in Britain.

I think Medicus is a well-written character-study of two people, and a historical romance novel rich with humanity. Like all good romances, the two people, Ruso and Tilla, begin by seeming worlds apart, and by the end of the book they seem a perfect fit. They make a good couple, better together than they are apart, and they share the same values.

For me, Medicus was a book to savor, to read slowly, to enjoy for the romance, the characters, the history, and for the portrayal of the constants of humanity through place and time.

From reading some readers' reviews, I suspect that a marketer once thought it would be a good idea to promote Ruth Downie's Ruso Series with the line "If you like Lindsey Davis's Falco, you'll love Ruso!" Whomever did this, did Ruth Downie and book-buyers a disservice. The two series are like chalk and cheese, as the British say; they are not comparable.

Davis's Falco Series is a first-person narrated, joke-filled, spoof of 1940s hard-boiled detective fiction, set in Ancient Rome. It is dotted with Roman history lessons that read as if they came straight from Wikipedia, presented like "Roman History For Dummies" from Falco's mouth to the reader.

Downie's Ruso Series is a third-person-limited narrated, serious-themed work dotted with dry humor, written in the style of a Traditional British Mystery (think Dorothy L. Sayers), set in Ancient Rome. The history of the period is embedded in the story, with the author wearing her vast knowledge lightly.

Because the author does not present the history pontifically, I have actually seen reviewers scoff at the a "dubious" history of very Roman things in Medicus, such as divorce, brothels, hospitals, medical capability, public administration, taxes, loans and debts, a postal service, and the use of inches and miles.

Briticisms also seem to be a problem for some readers, such as the word "corn", which is a generic term for "grain", and not the American "corn" which comes on a cob, which is actually, officially, called "maize".

That the ancient world was like ours, appears to stun some readers, if you read the low-rated reviews. They seem to expect the past to be foreign to us, but the author skillfully shows us that wherever people live under a similar system of a unifying bureaucracy paid for by taxes, with a similar capitalistic economic system funded on credit, society will shape itself into a lifestyle that we, in the "West", will find recognizable.

Human nature is the only constant through time, which seems to be another surprise for some readers of the Ruso Series. Again, the author skillfully shows us the truth of this, and that today's professional soldiers have much in common with their predecessors. And the town that exists around the Roman Military Fort would be recognizable to anyone who has seen the towns that surround U.S. Military Bases around the world.

I mention these reviewer-confusions because they strike me as unfair criticisms of this fine book.

Read my full and illustrated review at Italophile Book Reviews
http://italophilebookreviews.blogspot...

I was really thrilled when I finished this, because I was all like, “Yay! FINALLY ONE I DON’T HAVE TO KEEP!” Don’t get me wrong–this is an entertaining mystery, but it’s not one that I need to have in my collection, which means that I don’t have to pack it! OH JOY!

But I digress.

Ruso, a Roman military doctor, is stationed in Britain after a nasty divorce and the death of his feckless father. He’s burdened by debt (dad lived it up and paid on credit) and bummed out by the bad weather (he was stationed in Africa before, and now he’s stuck with British fog). Basically, he is strapped for cash and in a foul mood, but when he sees a slave owner mistreating a slave girl with an obviously-broken arm, he snaps and uses the rest of his cash to buy her at a bargain and then nurse her back to health. Which is altruistic and all, but since he doesn’t have the money to keep her, he “comes to his senses” and decides to sell her the second she can use her arm again.

Awww. How touching.

In the meantime, though, the town whores–who are also slaves–are going missing under mysterious and kinda gross circumstances. People tell Ruso not to investigate, but of course he investigates. And his slave, Tilla, starts making inquiries of her own.

I liked this for the simple reason that usually when I read books about Rome, they don’t really concentrate on what it would have been like to be an ordinary slave. People are often like, “Well, Roman slavery wasn’t that bad–you could eventually free yourself or even become a prominent member of society while still enslaved!” But those were the exceptions, not the rule. Downie does a good job of showing the full horror of what being owned by another human being entailed: not having the right to so much as leave the house unless given permission, being forced to work whether you were well or sick, being forced into prostitution if it suited your “master’s” purposes, and having no say in your future–a future dictated by the financial well-being and goodwill of your owner, not by anything you might do or say. I mean, all of those things are a big fat “duh,” but when writing about the Roman Empire, a lot of authors gloss them over.

Slavery differs from place to place and from time to time, but one fact never changes: as a slave, you’re subject to the whims and foibles of another, very fallible human being. And that never doesn’t suck.

Recommended for: If you like gritty mysteries, you’ll probably enjoy this.