Medicus, by Ruth Downie

Ruth Downie's first novel, Medicus: A Novel of the Roman Empire came out in 2006. I read it for the first time in 2007. A new one is due out any time, so it is now or never if I am going to review it.

...

I looked at it for a few days. Read a page here and there thinking maybe I'd get the needed inspiration for a review. Trouble was, I couldn't remember it well enough. Not well enough to describe, yet it is a murder mystery and as such had an ending that I knew. I was reluctant to read it again because there should be no suspense.

I was wrong. True: Passages I remembered had made me anxious because I wanted the section to come to an end quickly passed more comfortably the second time. I don't think the passage was supposed to seem interminable, so perhaps my second read was the right one. A year's break let me remember who the bad guy was and that the good guy got a break in the end, but I forgot most details.

Good mystery fiction throws in clues along the way, but doesn't give it all away before the climax -- at least to mystery readers like me who enjoy being kept in suspense until the last minute. But mystery fiction that is re-readable has to offer more, especially since lots of people try to out-detect the sleuth. Good historical fiction pays close attention to the details of the setting, striving to make it historically plausible. It should also present sympathetic characters and wind up the reader's emotions.

As I've already mentioned, Downie does a very good job of tying the reader's stomach in knots. She presents a picture of Roman Britain that doesn't shout "anachronism" at the relatively well-informed reader. I am not certain that the aplomb with which the doctor handles a punctured lung is likely, but fortunately, I'm not a medic and so have little to go on in the area of what's medically accurate.

In addition, Downie has allied herself poetically with her prose to create an smoothly readable, humorous first novel about a recently divorced army doctor who comes to the wilds of Britain to serve Rome. Lacking the social skills his ex-wife guarded for the family and having a family secret he's afraid will be used to take advantage of him, the title's Medicus, Ruso, tries to stay in the background. He's not even the good-looking doctor, but he's still on call socially and as a care-taking sort, winds up looking into accidents a bit more deeply than the locals would like.

I can't predict whether Ruso will turn out to be another Falco or Ruth Downie another Lindsey Davis, but with all of the Roman Empire under the second century Good Emperors to explore, I'm looking forward to seeing lots more of Ruso and the Daughter of Lugh tackling medical issues and murders from their opposed, but sometimes complementary perspectives.

There! Now I can go order Ruth Downie's Terra Incognita.