Hadrian’s Coming, Look Busy
What do you do if your peace is shattered by a murder spree and a gossip-obsessed historian?
I really enjoyed Hadrian’s Coming, Look Busy. Calvus was a fun narrator, and I liked the dry humor throughout the story. The Roman setting, mystery, and interesting characters kept me engaged. A fun read for anyone who enjoys historical mysteries with a comedic touch.
Goodreads Review
All Laelius Calvus wants to do in life is to make glass, drink beer and eat stolen cheese. When his brother-in-law’s brother arrives in the full military regalia of a Praetorian Guard tribune and threatens to haul Calvus back to Rome and lucrative employment, Calvus tells him in no uncertain terms to sod off. Glorious, stylus-pushing desk jobs with the most prolific historian of the age are not his style.
His dreams of solitude and anonymity are over once bodies start appearing in the creeks around him. Everyone, from questionable merchants to arguably the most powerful man that Calvus will ever meet, all believe that he is uniquely qualified to solve these murders. Can he keep everybody off his back or will he be dragged away home, leaving friends and business partners in the lurch or worse… killed?
Hadrian’s Coming, Look Busy is the second book of the Laelius Calvus Mysteries.
Chapter One
My brother-in-law’s brother is a jerk.
He had no reason to be at my house trying to give me money on the day that the first body washed ashore. When it snagged on the riverbank in my backyard, he had to get all official about it.
I wanted to push it back into the water and let it float away to become somebody else’s problem.
He said no.
And now, because of him, you have to tolerate the mind-blowing rant that follows this paragraph but I promise that all will become clear. Ultimately, this is the story of how I came to be hiding in the bedroom cupboard of the Empress of Rome. I just need to get some things off my chest first because I don’t do well with idiots.
There are some things that you should understand before you make up your mind about the situation, starting with, of all things, the Praetorian Guards. The Praetorian Guards are the eight-thousand strong personal bodyguard of the Emperor. It’s their job to make sure that no-one dispatches the Emperor to personally meet the gods of the underworld before his time. With eight thousand Praetorians, you’d think the chances of political assassination would be slim to none, but, well… for the last one hundred and forty-eight years a succession of senators, potential heirs and military generals have all asked themselves the same question: ‘if there absolutely has to be an emperor, why can’t it be me?’
Nine out of the thirteen previous Emperors have died in suspicious circumstances. That’s quite a hit rate, really. For a while the Praetorian Guards seemed likely to turn a blind eye, if not assassinate their charge themselves but these days they appear well behaved. They haven’t killed an Emperor in years.
And that is where this situation gets unnecessarily complicated. You see, my youngest sister Tertia is married to the twin brother of a Praetorian Guard. I have never met her husband for reasons that will become apparent, but if his twin is any indication, I’m not sure I want to anymore.
Tertia’s husband’s brother could have been any of the seven thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine other Praetorians and I would have congratulated her. As far as distant in-laws go, I imagine that any one of them would be a cheerful companion, someone whom you would welcome into your house when they turn up unannounced on your doorstep, armed with a letter of introduction and an expectation to be invited inside.
But not Praetorian Marcus Caelius Natta.
Marcus Caelius Natta is different.
He’s special.
He’s on the personal staff of the Praetorian Prefect who advises the Emperor Hadrian himself.
And Marcus Caelius Natta has decided that his brother’s brother-in-law (me, Titus Laelius Calvus, self-exiled to the deepest depths of the Empire – Londinium) is a charity case worth ‘saving’.
I really wish he wouldn’t. I’m happy here and there is nothing more I need in the world, but Marcus Caelius Natta believes otherwise. He believes that I should be bettering myself. He believes that I should move into an occupation worthy of my father’s expectations, one other than a menial craft – some stylus-pushing desk job as a lawyer, in keeping with my family’s recent rise in stature given my sister’s marriage into Natta’s family.
He believes that, ultimately, I should be aiming to reconcile with my father and return to my birthright in Rome, such as it is, as if I were a responsible adult.
And Marcus Caelius Natta also believes that when a body washes up on your back doorstep, it is every citizen’s civic duty to report it to the local garrison and turn their house over to a contingent of investigators, who trampled my first attempt at a vegetable garden, scared my chickens, and assumed that they could help themselves to my beer in order to congratulate themselves on a job well done for merely dragging the thing above the high water line.
I can’t stand my brother-in-law’s brother.
End of rant.
