John Maddox Roberts

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.

SPQR I: The Kings Gambit

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.

SPQR II: The Catiline Conspiracy

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.

SPQR IV: The Temple of the Muses

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.

SPQR III: The Sacrilege

Like so many young men in later generations, Roman playboy/detective Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger is faced with the necessity of serving in his country's armed forces. Since a dangerous enemy has become powerful in the politics of Rome, Decius is just as well out of the city for a while. He sets out to join Caesar in Gaul (where the general has come and seen, but has as yet not been able to conquer. The occupying Roman army is at a standstill. When Decius shows up in full parade regalia (much to the amusement of the more informally uniformed veterans) and accompanied only by his young personal slave. Caesar sets him the task of discovering who murdered one of his centurions, a cruel and unfair officer feared and hated by every man of the one hundred soldiers under him. A further prod to Decius is that the main suspect is a youth whose father is a close friend of the Metellus family. With Caesar's decree that another killer be found in a matter of hours or the young man dies, Decius has his work cut out for him. John Maddox Roberts's series set in the first century A.D. vividly brings to readers a strong sense of the everyday life of the ancient Romans in the context of our own.

SPQR VI: Nobody Loves a Centurion

Ancient Roman detective Decius Caecilius Metellus returns to solve the case of a woman accused of poisoning her powerful husband, a seemingly open-and-shut case that seems simple, until obstacles that Decius never would have expected begin to appear. Reprint. 15,000 first printing.

SPQR V: Saturnalia

When the Tribune Ateius, a fierce adversary, is murdered after uttering a terrible curse on the Roman empire, Decius Cecilius Metellus is assigned to solve the mystery amid the period's superstitions and volatile politics. Reprint.

SPQR VII: The Tribune's Curse

Conan The Champion (Conan)

The year of confusion

Under Vesuvius

The Princess and the Pirates (SPQR IX)

The River God's Vengeance (SPQR VIII)

Space Angel

Senatus Populus Que Romanus

Kristian Lutze

Der Frevel des Clodius. SPQR. Ein Krimi aus dem alten Rom.

ein Krimi aus dem alten Rom ; SPQR

To dliche Saturnalien

Eine diplomatische Mission fu hrt Decius Cecilius Metellus nach Alexandria. Prompt wird er in eine Verschwo rung gegen das Imperium verwickelt und gera t in Lebensgefahr.

John Maddox Roberts

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