bemoregarnet's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
dogearedtatty's review against another edition
3.0
Would’ve been higher, but found it harder than usual to keep all the characters straight, let alone their roles and relationships.
assaphmehr's review against another edition
4.0
Falco explores one of the most ancient of mysteries in Roman society, the Vestal Virgins.
Expect a review of Rome's religious institutions circa the time of Vespasian. The Vestal Virgins were still prominent, respected, and iconic figures in Roman life. They sit in the front row at the circus with the emperor, and take care of sacred duties.
The serious, twisting mystery is a race against time to find a lost little girl that is destined to join the Vestals. This is tempered by Falco's rather humorous role as the Procurator of the Sacred Geese. Add in his evovling family life and the Roman scenery, and this is another classic Davis novel.
Be aware that while it's not necessary to read the books in order, it certainly helps - certainly so far into the series.
--
[a:Assaph Mehr|14422472|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1445823325p2/14422472.jpg], author of [b:Murder In Absentia|29500700|Murder In Absentia (Felix the Fox, #1)|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1457914061s/29500700.jpg|46845657]: A story of Togas, Daggers, and Magic - for lovers of Ancient Rome, Murder Mysteries, and Urban Fantasy.
Expect a review of Rome's religious institutions circa the time of Vespasian. The Vestal Virgins were still prominent, respected, and iconic figures in Roman life. They sit in the front row at the circus with the emperor, and take care of sacred duties.
The serious, twisting mystery is a race against time to find a lost little girl that is destined to join the Vestals. This is tempered by Falco's rather humorous role as the Procurator of the Sacred Geese. Add in his evovling family life and the Roman scenery, and this is another classic Davis novel.
Be aware that while it's not necessary to read the books in order, it certainly helps - certainly so far into the series.
--
[a:Assaph Mehr|14422472|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1445823325p2/14422472.jpg], author of [b:Murder In Absentia|29500700|Murder In Absentia (Felix the Fox, #1)|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1457914061s/29500700.jpg|46845657]: A story of Togas, Daggers, and Magic - for lovers of Ancient Rome, Murder Mysteries, and Urban Fantasy.
futurelegend's review against another edition
5.0
Once more we delve into the murkier side of 1st-century Rome with Marcus Didius Falco. The joy of reading Lindsey Davis's historical whodunnits is that she uses her extensive and deep research into the world of Vespasian's Rome – the period we know most about everyday Roman life because it's the decade before Vesuvius left a valuable snapshot – to bring the Roman Empire and its traditions alive. In a way that leaves a lesser role for the actual crime and its investigation, but that shouldn't be taken to mean this isn't a real nail-biter to the very end.
Falco and his immediate family Helena Justina, baby Julia Junilla and disreputable dog Nux are back in Rome, summoned by Vespasian to receive imperial thanks for his work on the Census (tax enforcement in other words). Falco is raised by a grateful Empire to the Equestrian rank he has long sought, though the fiscally-prudent emperor has declined to furnish the entry fee, simply awarding him a priestly sinecure as Procurator of the Sacred Geese and Sacrificial Chickens. It sounds like a good joke but Vespasian is no fool, and it leads Falco into the world of religious cults: the Vestal Virgins, the Arval Brotherhood and a strangely dysfunctional and secretive priestly family, in search of a missing six-year-old and the deranged killer of an Arval Brother. Naturally, everything is intertwined. But once the killer has been identified, will the little girl be found safely?
One of the very best of the series so far.
Falco and his immediate family Helena Justina, baby Julia Junilla and disreputable dog Nux are back in Rome, summoned by Vespasian to receive imperial thanks for his work on the Census (tax enforcement in other words). Falco is raised by a grateful Empire to the Equestrian rank he has long sought, though the fiscally-prudent emperor has declined to furnish the entry fee, simply awarding him a priestly sinecure as Procurator of the Sacred Geese and Sacrificial Chickens. It sounds like a good joke but Vespasian is no fool, and it leads Falco into the world of religious cults: the Vestal Virgins, the Arval Brotherhood and a strangely dysfunctional and secretive priestly family, in search of a missing six-year-old and the deranged killer of an Arval Brother. Naturally, everything is intertwined. But once the killer has been identified, will the little girl be found safely?
One of the very best of the series so far.
bexwat's review
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
vesper1931's review against another edition
5.0
I am now at the eleventh book in the re-reading of the series. Helena and Falco are back in Rome and Falco has been promoted to Equestrian status and is now the Procurator of the Sacred Poultry.
This book concerns murder (of course) and vestal virgins.
This book concerns murder (of course) and vestal virgins.
rhosynmd's review against another edition
adventurous
informative
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.75
smcleish's review
4.0
Originally published on my blog here in February 2001.
By the first century AD, many of the traditional observances of Roman religion must have seemed silly and irrelevant. They were appropriate to the small farming village hundreds of years in the past, so they are about things like making crops grow, not the concerns of the largest and most cosmopolitan city in the world. Nevertheless, this feeling would have been accompanied by a certain reverence, for the cult practices were relics of a time seen as simple and virtuous. At the very least, an assumed reverence would have been politic in public. The cults were also an established path to political honours: Julius Caesar himself held the post of Pontifex Maximus.
In One Virgin Too Many, Davies' detective Falco becomes involved in several aspects of this, as one of the candidates for the lottery for a new Vestal Virgin comes to see him and tells him that one of her family has threatened to kill her, and a member of a corn cult, an Arval Brother, is killed at one of their ceremonies as though he were an animal sacrifice. These provide the crime side of the novel, and much of the humour comes from Falco's appointment to the fairly ridiculous office of the Procurator of the Sacred Poultry, responsible for the welfare of official birds including the sacred geese on the Capitol hill (descendants of geese who warned the city of an attack in the past).
This is one of the most amusing novels in the series, but it still has a fairly complex investigation; extremely satisfying.
By the first century AD, many of the traditional observances of Roman religion must have seemed silly and irrelevant. They were appropriate to the small farming village hundreds of years in the past, so they are about things like making crops grow, not the concerns of the largest and most cosmopolitan city in the world. Nevertheless, this feeling would have been accompanied by a certain reverence, for the cult practices were relics of a time seen as simple and virtuous. At the very least, an assumed reverence would have been politic in public. The cults were also an established path to political honours: Julius Caesar himself held the post of Pontifex Maximus.
In One Virgin Too Many, Davies' detective Falco becomes involved in several aspects of this, as one of the candidates for the lottery for a new Vestal Virgin comes to see him and tells him that one of her family has threatened to kill her, and a member of a corn cult, an Arval Brother, is killed at one of their ceremonies as though he were an animal sacrifice. These provide the crime side of the novel, and much of the humour comes from Falco's appointment to the fairly ridiculous office of the Procurator of the Sacred Poultry, responsible for the welfare of official birds including the sacred geese on the Capitol hill (descendants of geese who warned the city of an attack in the past).
This is one of the most amusing novels in the series, but it still has a fairly complex investigation; extremely satisfying.
assaphmehr's review
4.0
Falco explores one of the most ancient of mysteries in Roman society, the Vestal Virgins.
Expect a review of Rome's religious institutions circa the time of Vespasian. The Vestal Virgins were still prominent, respected, and iconic figures in Roman life. They sit in the front row at the circus with the emperor, and take care of sacred duties.
The serious, twisting mystery is a race against time to find a lost little girl that is destined to join the Vestals. This is tempered by Falco's rather humorous role as the Procurator of the Sacred Geese. Add in his evovling family life and the Roman scenery, and this is another classic Davis novel.
Be aware that while it's not necessary to read the books in order, it certainly helps - certainly so far into the series.
--
[a:Assaph Mehr|14422472|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1445823325p2/14422472.jpg], author of [b:Murder In Absentia|29500700|Murder In Absentia (Felix the Fox, #1)|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1457914061s/29500700.jpg|46845657]: A story of Togas, Daggers, and Magic - for lovers of Ancient Rome, Murder Mysteries, and Urban Fantasy.
Expect a review of Rome's religious institutions circa the time of Vespasian. The Vestal Virgins were still prominent, respected, and iconic figures in Roman life. They sit in the front row at the circus with the emperor, and take care of sacred duties.
The serious, twisting mystery is a race against time to find a lost little girl that is destined to join the Vestals. This is tempered by Falco's rather humorous role as the Procurator of the Sacred Geese. Add in his evovling family life and the Roman scenery, and this is another classic Davis novel.
Be aware that while it's not necessary to read the books in order, it certainly helps - certainly so far into the series.
--
[a:Assaph Mehr|14422472|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1445823325p2/14422472.jpg], author of [b:Murder In Absentia|29500700|Murder In Absentia (Felix the Fox, #1)|Assaph Mehr|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1457914061s/29500700.jpg|46845657]: A story of Togas, Daggers, and Magic - for lovers of Ancient Rome, Murder Mysteries, and Urban Fantasy.
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