Being under suspicion of murder did not hamper my freedom. This is because Romans are civilized people and don't clap suspects into prison like barbarians do. It would take an order of a lawfully convened court even to place me under house arrest.That's Decius Caecilius Metellus speaking---Senator Decius Caecilius Metellus, please. He is at an outdoor rally in Rome where he is campaigning for election to the praetorship. It looks like a shoo-in, until a man named Fulvius, of whom Decius has never heard, arrives at the preelection proceedings with a small army of hoodlums and begins to shout to the assembled voters that Decius is a thief and worse. While this is not an unknown effort used to ruin a candidate's chances, it is enough to have Decius's father call a meeting of family and friends--a meeting that ends with the participants going home determined to find some answers to stop Fulvius's efforts to ruin Decius's chances. Early the next...

Ancient Rome, in this accurate and evocative series, is just as politics driven as any major American city -- possibly even more. Decius Caecilius Metellus has, through a series of rather wild adventure, and in the act of tracking down killers and other reprobates, barely escaped annhilation several times. Now, newly elected to the office of aedile, the lowest rung on the ladder of Roman authority, he must smoke out corruption and conspiracy that threaten to destroy all of Rome.

Blackmail, corruption, treachery, murder—the glory that was Rome.In this Edgar Award-nominated mystery, John Maddox Roberts takes readers back to a Rome filled with violence and evil. Vicious gangs ruled the streets of Crassus and Pompey, routinely preying on plebeian and patrician alike, so the garroting of a lowly ex-slaved and the disembowelment of a foreign merchant in the dangerous Subura district seemed of little consequence to the Roman hierarchy. But Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger—highborn commander of the local vigiles—was determined to investigate. Despite official apathy, brazen bribes, and sinister threates, Decius uncovers a world of corruption at the highest levels of his government that threatens to destroy him and the government he serves.

When Roman junior senator Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger has a chance to join a diplomatic mission to Alexandria, he welcomes the opportunity to temporarily elude his enemies in the Eternal City-even though it means leaving his beloved Rome. Decius is just beginning to enjoy the outpost's many exotic pleasures when the suspicious death of an irascible philosopher occurs, coinciding with the puzzling and apocalyptic ravings of a charismatic cult leader. Intrigued, Decius requests and is given permission by the Egyptian Pharaoh to investigate the heinous crime. What he discovers is beyond shocking. And when the corpse of a famous courtesan mysteriously turns up in his bed, Decius suddenly finds himself entangled in a web of conspiracy far more widespread and dangerous than he ever imagined-one that threatens to bring about the downfall of the entire Empire.

Decius Caecilius Metellus, this year's magistrate for cases involving foreigners, is living the good life in southern Italy, happy to be away from Rome, a city suffering war jitters over Caesar's impending actions. He thinks he is merely visiting one of the local sights when he takes a party to visit the Oracle of the Dead, a pre-Roman cult site located at the end of a tunnel dug beneath a temple of Apollo. He quickly learns that there is a bitter rivalry between the priests of Apollo and those of Hecate, who guard the oracle.When the priests of Apollo are all killed, the countryside looks to explode in violence as Greeks, Romans and native Italians of several conquered nations bring out old enmities. Decius is caught squarely in the middle, desperate to find a way out that will pacify the district and, incidentally, save his own skin. This riveting series began with the Edgar Award-nominated SPQR and has gone on to international success in 13 languages.

“Readers looking for a crafty and entertaining journey to the past won’t be disappointed.” —Publishers Weekly on SPQR XI: Under Vesuvius Caius Julius Caesar, now Dictator of Rome, has decided to revise the Roman calendar, which has become out of sync with the seasons. As if this weren’t already an unpopular move, Caesar has brought in astronomers and astrologers from abroad, including Egyptians, Greeks, Indians and Persians. Decius is appointed to oversee this project, which he knows rankles the Roman public: “To be told by a pack of Chaldeans and Egyptians how to conduct their duties towards the gods was intolerable.” Not long after the new calendar project begins, two of the foreigners are murdered. Decius begins his investigations and, as the body count increases, it seems that an Indian fortuneteller popular with patrician Roman ladies is also involved. This latest in the acclaimed series is sure to please...

In SPQR XI: Under Vesuvius, things are going well for Decius Caecilius Metellus. He is Praetor Peregrinus, which means he has to judge a case or two, but those cases are outside of the City. His cases will be those dealing with foreigners, and all of Italy is his province. His first stop is Campania, "Italy's most popular resort district." Decius and his wife, Julia, are happy for a change of scenery. But the good times end when, in a town near Vesuvius, a priest's daughter is murdered. Decius must find her killer and keep the mob off a young boy who everyone blames but he believes to be innocent. Decius may have acquired more prestige, but he's also acquired more trouble. With his SPQR novels, John Maddox Roberts has written a satisfying and entertaining historical mystery series. The stakes just keep getting higher in this latest atmospheric puzzle.

This eagerly awaited fifth book in John Maddox Roberts's Edgar-nominated historical mystery series once again takes the reader back to the Rome of Julius Caesar and the Roman Senator Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger. Decius has won himself a reputation as both an investigator and, most unfortunately, a bit of a playboy. Having been banished by his family for sometimes embarrassing activities to a rather leisurely lifestyle on Rhodes, he is puzzled to be suddenly and unexpectedly summoned home to assist in an investigation.Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer, a relative of Decius and his family and the head of a powerful political clan, has been poisoned, and his infamous wife Clodia is immediately suspected of disposing of her rather inconvenient husband. Not entirely convinced of Clodia's guilt, Decius delves into the intricacies of Rome's ruling class and discovers that a clandestine, forbidden witches' cult is inextricably intertwined with some very highborn...

Julius Caesar, as we know, arrived in Gaul (now France) and announced "I Came, I Saw, I Conquered," but when Decius Metellus arrives from Rome, not seeking military glory but rather avoiding an enemy currently in power, he finds that although the general came and saw, so far, at least, he has far from conquered. The campaign seems at a standstill.Decius's arrival disappoints the great Caesar as well. He has been waiting for promised reinforcements from Rome, an influx of soldiers to restart his invasion. Instead he is presented with one young man ridiculously decked out in military parade finery and short on military skills, accompanied not by eager troops but by one callow and reluctant slave, the feckless Hermes.It soon develops, however, that Decius's arrival was fortuitous. When Vinius, the army's cruelest centurion (so-called because he commands a hundred soldiers), is found murdered, Caesar remembers that his new recruit has successfully come up with...

It was a summer of glorious triumph for the mighty Roman Republic. Her invincible legions had brought all foreign enemies to their knees. But in Rome there was no peace. The streets were flooded with the blood of murdered citizens, and there were rumors of more atrocities to come. Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger was convinced a conspiracy existed to overthrow the government-a sinister cabal that could only be destroyed from within. But admission into the traitorous society of evil carried a grim price: the life of Decius's closest friend...and maybe his own.

When a sacret woman's rite in the ancient city of Rome is infiltrated by a corrupt patrician dressed in female garb, it falls to Senator Decuis Caecilius Metellus the Younger, whose investigative skills have proven indispensable in the past, to unmask the perpetrators. When four brutal slayings follow, Decius enlists the help a notorious and dangerous criminal. Together, they establish a connection between the sacrilege and the murders, and track the offenders from the lowest dregs of society to the prominent elite of the upper class, finding corruption and violence where Decius least expects it.

Decius Caecilius Metellus is happy. The weather is beautiful and he is standing for office (literally; standing, in the Roman Forum soliciting votes) with a sure chance of winning. And Caesar's ongoing dreary war is far off in Gaul. Decius is confident that another war looming over Rome, instigated by one Crassus against the Parthians (for no reason but possible worldly gain); will be voted down in the Senate. But the vote does not stop Crassus.On the day he and his troops set out from Rome, the Tribune Ateius Capitus, leader of the opposition, shrieks an ancient and terrible curse over the huge crowd assembled — a curse that frightens not only the man in the street but the highest Romans. When Ateius is murdered soon after, Decius, solver of past mysteries, has the ugly task of finding the killer. Fascinating details of Rome's mixed attitudes about the power of magic and the practice of rational politics illuminate this latest of Roberts's strong historical...

Sequel to HANNIBAL'S CHILDREN, this alternate history follows Marcus Scipio, a brilliant young Roman from one of the oldest patrician families, and Titus Norbanus, the ambitious son of a "new" Roman family from Gaul, whose skillfully-orchestrated battles are earning him fame and infamy -- depending whose side you're on -- in the Senate and among the Roman people. Set over a hundred years after Hannibal defeated Rome in the Second Punic War, the exiled Romans have returned to Italy and retaken their beloved city of the seven hills. But Rome will never feel safe until Carthage is destroyed. While Norbanus, who fancies himself a new Alexander the Great, expands the Roman Empire and defeats enemies, young Scipio in Alexandria, with the backing of the Egyptian queen, invites "philosophers" with scientific and engineering skills to the Alexandrian Library's school to create new inventions, from submarines to telescopes to flying machines, that will transform warfare -- and the world. Sequel to the novel Library Journal called "a well-researched and vivid alternate history of the rivalry between Rome and Carthage." "Mastering the details of later republican Roman life, Roberts builds a very convincing alternate Rome, full of in triguing characters who pose readers the fun of figuring out their real-life counterparts."- Booklist "{Roberts} is perfectly at home in thesprawl of ancient Rome."- Publishers Weekly on HANNIBAL'S CHILDREN:"First-rate, intriguing … John Maddox Roberts … proves that he's perfectly at home in the urban sprawl of ancient Rome … He does an admirable job of navigating through a difficult and challenging conceit, providing plenty of reflective material for history buffs while constructing an intriguing story line that pays tribute to the ingenuity of the Romans.”-Publisher’s Weekly “The author of THE KING’S GAMBIT and THE CATILINE CONSPIRACY provides a well-researched and vivid alternate history of the rivalry between Rome and Carthage.”-Library Journal “A fascinating alternate history novel … The Reader is immersed in the culture of Rome.”- Midwest Book Review "Exciting, provocative, and entertaining … This is far and away the best book I've read by Roberts."- Science Fiction Chronicle on the SPQR novels:"Wonderful … All the wild imaginative stimulation of the best detective fiction."- Marion Zimmer Bradley, author of The Mists ofAvalon "Roberts deftly re-creates his ancient world, constantly re minding the reader that it was a cruel and violent place where people thought and acted a lot differently from us. A double-edged solution perfectly caps a highly entertaining story."- Publishers Weekly author bio:John Maddox Roberts is the author of more than 50 books in the mystery, SF and historical genres. His novel SPQR was nominated for the Edgar Award and the series is now up to 13 volumes and 13 languages. He also writes the contemporary Gabe Treloar private eye novels. He lives in Estancia, New Mexico with his wife, Beth, and an indeterminate number of cats.From BooklistRoberts continues the story of Hannibal's Children (2002), in which Hannibal conquered Rome, and the banished Romans retreated to the Danube, conquered those living along it, and built a Rome in exile. In this book, Rome has reconquered Italy and is resettling it to be as it was before the Carthaginians came. But even as the Romans rebuild, intramural political conflicts generate brawls in the newly restored Curia. One of the most serious conflicts is between the old families, whose ancestors were banished from Rome, and the "New Men" descended from Gauls and Germans who threw their lot in with Roma Noricum. As new war with Carthage looms, four legions are in Egypt, cut off from direct return to Italy; their commander, New Man Titus Norbanus, has some very untraditional ideas about what can be done. Mastering the details of later republican Roman life, Roberts builds a very convincing alternate Rome, full of intriguing characters who pose readers the fun of figuring out their real-life counterparts. Frieda MurrayCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reservedAbout the AuthorIn addition to his works of science fiction and fantasy, John Maddox Roberts is also the author of the SPQR books, a series of mystery novels set in ancient Rome.

About the AuthorIn addition to his works of science-fiction and fantasy, John Maddox Roberts is also the author of the SPQR books, a series of mystery novels set in ancient Rome. He lives with his family in New Mexico. The story of Hannibal’s Children will continue in Roberts’s next novel, The Seven Hills.

As I walked back through the City, my mood was moderately elevated. This appointment did not displease me nearly as much as I pretended. Like most Romans I abhorred the very thought of sea duty, but this was one of the rare occasions when I was looking forward to getting away from Rome..... For years I had complained of the disorder of the City, and now that it was gone, I found that I missed it. All the peace and quiet seemed unnatural. I did not expect it to last.- Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger in SPQR IX: The Princess and the PiratesHis two years of aedileship over, Decius is ready for his next adventure. He would rather do anything than join the war with Caesar in the dismal forests of Gaul, so he and his slave/protégé Hermes find themselves on a mission to rid the Mediterranean of pirates. They set off with shoddy ships and sailors to the island of Cyprus, where a young Cleopatra is staying. Between her impressive...