Three Hands in the Fountain by Lindsey Davis
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Falco and his good friend Petro find a decaying hand in the local fountain and stumble into solving a good ol' fashioned mystery. Three Hands in the Fountain is a return to what I like best in the Falco series--street characters and action set in the city of Rome with a misogynistic serial killer on the loose who has to be found before he kills again. Falco discovering bits of women's bodies in the aqueducts and trying to work out the psyche of the killer gives the story a rather modern flair. About the only thing that slow the story's pacing are long descriptions of the Roman water supply system itself. (Agreed it was quite an achievement, but can we stick with the characters and their emotions a bit longer, please? I'm not a civil engineer!) Helena Justina makes only token appearances and one hopes her role increases in later stories as their child grows up. Still, Three Hands in the Fountain is an enjoyable read for fans of the series.
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The King Arthur Trilogy Book One: Dragon's Child by M. K. Hume
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
I'll only touch on a few things for this review, but I have to say that overall I wasn't that impressed with the writing style. The "head-hopping" (or constant point-of-view switching) drove me up a wall. Here I am as a published author thinking how my editors would have told me to do a complete rewrite if I head-hopped as much as Ms. Hume does in this book. The end result of using this "omniscient narrator" (head-hopping) creates an emotional distance from the characters, especially the main character of Artorex. Yes, his name is a Roman name and not "Arthur" that you'd might think considering the long title of the book/trilogy. I'm okay that Ms. Hume wants to make Artorex a Celt brought up by a Roman family, although by 600 AD how many pure bred "Romans" are left in Britain, really? (And why are Celts seen to be "deficient" in their warrior ways that only a Roman could do the job right?) It's the emotional distance that the reader feels that sinks the story, because we never stay in any one character's POV for very long--I'm talking about head-hopping every other paragraph in some scenes. Without staying in one POV and feeling a deep connection to the young and struggling Artorex, you really don't get a feel for him as a character or even care for what happens to him. What makes this any different than reading a non-fiction article on the legend of Arthur/Artorex? One spoiler--there is no "magic" or fantasy elements in this story, so some readers who enjoy Arthurian legend will be disappointed. But if you like a story that's simply told to you about a young Celtic boy raised in a Roman manner to become the High King of the Britons, and you don't mind head-hopping, then this is the book for you.
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Time to Depart by Lindsey Davis
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Time to Depart brings Roman sleuth Marcus Didius Falco alive once again for me after a rather slow ride in the last book in the series. Returned to his home town of the seven hills, political corruption, crime, theft, murder, and old friends and family members abound in this story. Falco is hired on to help solve the mystery of who is behind the robbery of an entire marketplace worth of goods after his friend in the vigils, Petro, sends a noted gangster up the river (or rather, gets the crime boss exiled from Roman territory). If Pius isn't the criminal mastermind, who is? Lalage, the brothel keeper, isn't talking, and neither is Pius's bitter wife or vacuous daughter. Add in the domestic troubles of being asked to officiate as a priest at his landlord's wedding (ugh!), discovering a baby thrown in a skip, "adopting" a mutt that follows him about, trying to find his missing niece, and learning that he's about to become a father with his lover Helena Justina, and Falco has more than his hands full. Time to Depart is fast paced and full of action, suspense and plenty of characters to keep readers entertained. Well done!
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Last Act in Palmyra by Lindsey Davis
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
It's been a few years since I read a Falco mystery by Lindsey Davis so when I finally got a hold of Last Act in Palmyra, I was happy to delve into the world of ancient Rome once again. Falco is the same sleuth as he ever was--resourceful, trustworthy, worldly, cynical, and madly in love with a senator's daughter, Helena Justina. The setting in the cities of the Decapolis is interesting, and the details of everyday life in the first century Roman world are fascinating, as Davis is terrific with bringing such historical things to life. Unfortunately, the same couldn't be said for all the characters. About the only thing that spoiled this installment in the series is the tediousness of the storyline and how the various stock characters of the traveling theatre troupe in which Falco and Helena travel seemed to blur together in your mind. The story's pacing is slow compared with earlier capers, and I wasn't quite as excited to keep turning pages since I'd figured out who had committed the murder long before Falco showed signs that he even had a clue. I'm not a big mystery reader, so perhaps this wouldn't be a problem for most, but I missed the political intrigue and blood-and-guts action of the earlier books. Still, if you need a Falco fix, Last Act in Palmyra is sure to please.
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Master and God by Lindsey Davis
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
There's a reason why I don't put any author's books on an "automatically buy" list. Even if I love their earlier books, I don't necessarily believe I will love their later works. Such is the case (unfortunately) for Master and God. Having enjoyed Davis' Falco detective series, I thought I'd give this story a try--and trying it was.
In the Falco series the Roman history, culture and setting are seamlessly intertwined with fascinating and sympathetic characters, but the same can't be said of this book. The first part is a head-hopping nightmare. The point of view hops from omniscient to one character to the next (even within a paragraph). Then there's a head hop to a fly on the wall. Really! Having to edit and fix head-hopping problems in my own and others' manuscripts (Yes, I'm an evil editor), I don't care to read it in a professionally published book.
The second part of the story is a bit less head-hoppy, and the lovers Flavia Lucilla and Gaius Vinius are worth cheering for, but long "telling/info dumping" passages slow up the love story and cause frustration for both the lovers and the reader alike. It seems as if Davis couldn't figure out if she wanted to write a straight history of the reign of Domitian or a love story set in Rome. I wish she would have stuck with the second choice and edited the head-hopping and info dumping.
If readers could get a feel for Rome in the Falco series without chapter upon chapter of info dumping, surely Lucilla and Vinius' love story could have been written likewise. But if you enjoy Roman history and don't mind the romantic interruptions and head-hopping, Master and God might appeal to you.
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