Trade Secrets

Once again a book in the Marcus Corvinus series did not disappoint. The first requirement for reading these novels is to understand you will get modern language while the story takes place in ancient Rome, here in May, AD 41. That little bump in the road came as a shock to me when I read my first book in this series, but now I look forward to the easy way this complicated historical period is presented just by having it told in today's style of speaking. Everything else is kept strictly in the period so you still get all the flavor of ancient Rome.

Marcus Corvinus is willing to face multiple dangers when he's investigating, but when his wife Perilla has her poetry group meet at their house Marcus makes himself scarce. Unfortunately when he returns one of the group members is still there, waiting for him and none too pleased about that, because she wants him to investigate the murder of her brother. Gaius Tullius was found dead from a stab wound inside the Shrine of Melobosis and someone needs to find out what happened. When Marcus visits the widow he finds that not only is the sister of the deceased not very cut up about his death, neither does he find a grieving widow. Who was this Gaius Tullius that nobody seems to mourn? More out of general cussedness than anything else, Marcus decided to investigate. What he doesn't want to investigate is the scenario his daughter Marilla came across when she and husband Clarus were enjoying an outing. Who was the dead man stabbed while sitting on the park bench? Marcus doesn't really care until the two deaths begin to have close connections.

The wit is very much in evidence in this novel as Marcus travels the fourteen miles from Rome to Ostia to investigate both deaths. The Roman world is well represented and the mystery was quite good. It was a change to see how the citizens of Ostia didn't appear to be nearly as impressed to have a "purple striper" among them since the distance from Rome seemed to make them more independent of the government. There are many characters who return from previous novels and I got many a chuckle when Marcus and Perilla and Bathyllus ( major-domo for the household) were dealing with the cat from the next door neighbors. There are a lot of characters in this novel so you might want to make use of the Dramatis Personae in the beginning of the book to help you keep track. My one criticism is that it would have been a nice touch to have had a gathering-of-the-clan type of ending to tie up all the loose ends. Maybe next time.

I received an e-ARC of this novel through NetGalley.

Trade Secrets by David Wishart

Murders can be like chariots – you hang around waiting for one to turn up to investigate and before you know it you’ve got two on your hands. Purple-striper Marcus Corvinus and his wife Perilla have a house full. Their adopted daughter and son-in-law are visiting Rome with their baby son, fondly named Sprog by his hands-off grandfather, while Perilla is regularly playing host to her book club friends. Just before Marcus can get too frayed at the edges, he is saved by one of Perilla’s literary friends who reveals that her brother Gaius Tullius, part-owner of an import-export business, has just been found murdered in the rather sad and neglected Shrine of Melobosis. An initial investigation into Tullius’s business affairs and personal life reveals a whole host of potential suspects.

But, as if Marcus’s hands aren’t full enough, his daughter gleefully informs him that when she and her husband were visiting one of Rome’s libraries that day they discovered a man stabbed on a bench in the library gardens. If he hadn’t been dead already the knife attack would certainly have killed him. Sometimes it’s useful that Marcus’s son-in-law is a doctor.

The more Marcus digs (quite often by talking to indiscreet locals in Rome’s wine shops) it becomes inevitably clear that both crimes are linked, connected not just by people but also by a place, Ostia, Rome’s busy port. A trip is on the cards. The timing couldn’t be better. A feud with his next door neighbour – a feud begun over a dead cat – is threatening to get out of hand. Sea air will do Marcus and his household some good.

Trade Secrets is the seventeenth outing for my favourite Roman detective, Marcus Corvinus, and I have no hesitation in declaring it one of the best in the series and certainly my favourite of recent volumes. Although the series is well-established, each of the novels stands well alone and you can read them in any order you like. They reveal nothing about past books and cases. But when you’ve read every book in the series right from the beginning as I have then you may well find yourself as hooked as I am on the indolent aristocrat Marcus, his clever, organised wife Perilla and their family, which includes major-domo Bathyllus (who may have written the Roman book on etiquette and manners while looking down his imperial nose) and the temperamental, high-maintenance and extraordinarily gifted chef Meton. This family background comes to life even more in Trade Secrets thanks to the entertaining, distracting presence of the Sprog. I did miss the dog, though.

The usual political angle is also missing from this novel. Marcus has – or had – the misfortune of knowing Caligula and yet managed to survive that reign, and the influence of the emperors has left its mark on the books and Marcus’s cases over the years. But now, in AD 41, Claudius is emperor and Marcus is cousin to Claudius’s glamorous young wife Messalina so it looks like all will be well, not that he likes her very much. Trade Secrets might be less political than usual but this makes Marcus more relaxed, the mood is lighter, and the plot becomes much more significant. This is a good thing because the plot in Trade Secrets is excellent! You have to keep your eye on the ball – and the useful dramatis personae at the beginning – as it develops into a deliciously complex and convoluted case which keeps the reader as entertained as it does Marcus Corvinus.

Adding to the considerable appeal of Trade Secrets is the setting of Ostia. David Wishart always does a superb job of evoking long-dead roads, homes and businesses and now he turns that attention to Ostia. Ostia is one of my very favourite places and I absolutely loved how Wishart here populates its streets, wine shops and waterfront. The place is brought alive.

Unfortunately, as with other recent books in the series, the novel is far too short. I do wish they were longer. Nevertheless, Trade Secrets is perfectly structured, plotted and focused. As always, it is a joy to spend time with Marcus Corvinus as he uses charm, cheek and purple stripe to wheedle the truth out of everyone, especially those he shares a jug of wine with. If you’ve not yet met Corvinus then I do urge you to waste no time in making his acquaintance.

David Wishart suffuses trade with intrigue and romantic shenanigans in Trade Secrets the tenth Marcus Corvinus mystery. Set in Rome and Ostia at the time of Claudius. the womaniser Gauis Tulius is stabbed to death in a holy shrine. Family and business colleagues are suspects. Meanwhile another man dies in the Pollio Gardens. Suspicion leads to trade corruption in Ostia. Whodunit??? Read and find out. Seriously good reading.