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bookgazing) wrote2009-02-27 10:41 am
bookgazing) wrote2009-02-27 10:41 am
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Ode to a Banker - Lyndsey Davis
Any review I do of a Lyndsey Davis Falco novel is bound to be a gush (I'm actually thinking of making my regular blog feature Fangirl Friday where I give myself license to just gush). So I'll just quickly say:
I'd happily follow Falco and Helena around in a novel even if there was no crime solving involved. I love Petronius, Mai and Junilla Tacita.
The book has a great plot. Falco is hauled in by a publishing house who want him to pay to see his poems published. Soon after the proprieter of the publishing house, and the bank where most of Falco's mothers savings sit is found murdered in a gruesomely appropriate way. I'll just say that a scroll holder is inserted in a particularly nasty place. Falco finds himself investigating other aspiring authors while trying to keep his arch enemy, the spy Anacrites away from his sister and his mother!
This book is one of the first times I've seen Davis' books draw parralells so obviously between Roman society and our own. She draws attention to the con men out in the publishing industry and is merciless about certain kinds of authors, epecially those suffering from 'writers block'. This element reminded me of Terry Pratchett's later books which satirise contemporary society.
The first time I read anything by Lindsey Davis it was a short excerpt in my GCSE textbook to show how secondary sources can sometimes be more accurate than primary sources due to bias. I love a writer that does their research.
You can read the first chapter of the book for free at the Random House website.
I'd happily follow Falco and Helena around in a novel even if there was no crime solving involved. I love Petronius, Mai and Junilla Tacita.
The book has a great plot. Falco is hauled in by a publishing house who want him to pay to see his poems published. Soon after the proprieter of the publishing house, and the bank where most of Falco's mothers savings sit is found murdered in a gruesomely appropriate way. I'll just say that a scroll holder is inserted in a particularly nasty place. Falco finds himself investigating other aspiring authors while trying to keep his arch enemy, the spy Anacrites away from his sister and his mother!
This book is one of the first times I've seen Davis' books draw parralells so obviously between Roman society and our own. She draws attention to the con men out in the publishing industry and is merciless about certain kinds of authors, epecially those suffering from 'writers block'. This element reminded me of Terry Pratchett's later books which satirise contemporary society.
The first time I read anything by Lindsey Davis it was a short excerpt in my GCSE textbook to show how secondary sources can sometimes be more accurate than primary sources due to bias. I love a writer that does their research.
You can read the first chapter of the book for free at the Random House website.