The Marcus Didius Falco series

Lindsey Davis started this series sometime in the late 1980s. What makes this stand out among zillions of mystery and suspense novels?

For starters, it is based in Rome. And not the pasta-pizza Roma of today, but the Rome closer to the one brought to such comic life in the Asterix novels of Goschinny and Uderzo. Asterix's Rome is, of course, based in the times of Julius Caeser. Davis's Rome is nearly a century after that, in the time of Vespasian, but equally peppered with centurions, corrupt and cowardly, senators, gladiators and arenas with hungry lions and wolves. There's something very lovely in the music of those Roman names, be they as descriptive as Tremensdelirious or Tortuousconvolvulus (these are from Asterix, of course) or as stately as Decimus Camillus Verus or Lucius Petronillus Longus (from the less tongue-in-cheek, but equally entertaining Falco series).

The series is so superlatively good not just because of the story lines, but because of the amount of loving, intricate research that has gone into recreating that world for us. 1st century AD Rome is very familiar, but just foreign enough to keep a reader constantly making notes and comparing. Davis provides a detailed picture of the Roman class system, with the various snobberies associated with each class, by making her hero, Marcus Didius Falco, a lowly plebian, fall in love with Helena Justina, a girl from the patrician class. Falco's character is fully developed, not in the least bit one-dimensional like so many of the private detectives on TV today: he is an investigator, a great buddy, devoted husband and a really good father to his daughters. One of the scenes that captured my heart had him and his two-year old reviving a bumblebee with honey. Take that, Jack Bauer. True heroes make time for their women.

That's my review for the day. It's the Marcus Didius Falco series. Grab any book (there are 20 so far) and let 1st century Rome and its attractions and dangers envelope you.