Rome: Against a Setting Sun

Ten Latin scrolls turn up in Romania, telling how the Roman Republic self-destructed in the first century BC. Two protagonists, born eighteen months apart in the same mansion, live through this: Lucius, son of a wealthy Etruscan prince, and Horace, progeny of the prince’s slaves. After Horace’s death his diary and other sources inform Lucius’ first-person narrative: boyhood amid gang warfare in Rome, participation in the civil war after Julius Caesar’s assassination; loss of fathers and inheritances in the bloody Proscriptions; capture by pirates when sailing home; accompanying Octavian (later Augustus) at the final sea-battle; present in Egypt for the deaths of Antony and Cleopatra. Soon Horace becomes Rome’s Laureate, and Lucius Augustus’ private physician. They note menacing intrigue taking place in the palace. Augustus’ supporters and potential successors die in suspicious circumstances; Horace’s death is last. Lucius knows who the serial killer is, but he too is close to death...