Falco On Vacation
Apr. 22nd, 2008 12:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mtvesselJan 2008
Scandal takes a Holiday / See Delphi and Die - Lindsey Davis - Arrow Books, 2004 / 2005
* * * / * * *
It’s been a while since I have read a Lindsey Davis so it was nice to catch up on the doings of Marcus Didius Falco, although it is clear that she has had a few problems maintaining the standard. There are two main difficulties, firstly in finding original settings for the stories now that she has covered every conceivable aspect of life in the capital from gladiators to aqueducts to the legal system, and secondly in reconciling Falco’s new-found respectability as a middle-class father of two with his dodgy occupation as an informer. The former is solved neatly - in these two books Davis gets Falco out of Rome by sending him on working holidays, first to the domestic port of Ostia and then to the ancient ruins of Greece. The latter proves to be more problematic and perhaps explains why neither of these books is really a satisfying mystery.
Scandal Takes a Holiday centres around the disappearance of Infamia, the scandal writer of the Daily Gazette (yes, ancient Rome really did have a prototype newspaper, the Acta Diurna), whilst on holiday in Ostia. Falco is hired by the Gazette to track him down and decides to bring Helena and the children. There is a plot involving kidnap, dodgy builders, Cilician definitely-not-pirates and dubious Illyrians, but at least in the first half of the book this is overwhelmed by the hordes of Falco’s and Helena’s extended families who descend upon them one group at a time. Whilst the familial shenanigans are entertaining (and we finally learn something about the Uncle Whom Nobody Talks About), they do seriously interfere in the pacing of the mystery plot. They also render implausible the actions of the baddies, who despite knowing all about Falco’s unsubtle investigations don’t do the obvious thing and threaten his family to make him go away. What’s more, Falco himself doesn’t even consider the possibility that they might. Granted, he is often pretty dumb, but such lack of concern for his nearest and dearest is completely out of character. Infamia’s interesting occupation is also rather thrown away. Still, the description of Ostia as a bustling port is wonderfully evocative and the final resolution does tie everything together.
Davis evidently realised the realism problems that having a vulnerable family were causing, and makes the very sensible decision to have Falco dump the kids on the maternal grandparents for See Delphi and Die. This is perfectly reasonable because it is Helena’s mother who instigates the action. Aulus, Helena’s truculent elder brother, has been packed off to Greece to further his education, but en route has become involved in an incident at Olympia where a young bride, one of a party touring the site, has been found dead. Aulus has linked this with the murder of another young woman at the Olympic Games three years before and has gone off investigating, prompting his mother to send Falco to put him back on the straight and narrow. So off he goes with Helena, his adopted and now pert daughter Albia, and, showing a more characteristic concern for his womenfolk than in the previous book, two of his young nephews and the athletic son of his personal trainer as bodyguards.
The story is an entertaining cook’s tour of Olympia, Corinth, Delphi and Athens. As always, the settings are excellent - I particularly liked the evocation of Olympia as a sort of seedy Venice Beach inhabited by body-obsessed athletes in training for the forthcoming games. The characters in the tour party, when we eventually meet them, are just as varied and eccentric as the real people I have met on the various trips that I have done. The real disappointment in this book is the murder mystery - it is quite obvious from even a casual consideration of the circumstances that there is only one possible suspect, and although there is a slight twist, the information that leads to it is only revealed just before the end. It has to be said, however, that the final scene is memorable.
So two slightly disappointing though still entertaining books. The problem, I think, is that Falco has nowhere to go now - he has achieved the highest status in Roman society that he plausibly can, and his increasing family responsibilities mean that the peril level and the ruthlessness of the baddies have to be pegged back, making these latest stories less satisfying than his earlier adventures. The best thing that Davis could do would be to ruthlessly prune some of the supporting characters, or - perish the thought! - disrupt the overly cosy relationship between Falco and Helena, but it’s clear that she has no intention of doing this. Still, I’ll keep reading them - it’s a cold, hard world out there, and we all need a holiday from reality from time to time.
Scandal takes a Holiday / See Delphi and Die - Lindsey Davis - Arrow Books, 2004 / 2005
* * * / * * *
It’s been a while since I have read a Lindsey Davis so it was nice to catch up on the doings of Marcus Didius Falco, although it is clear that she has had a few problems maintaining the standard. There are two main difficulties, firstly in finding original settings for the stories now that she has covered every conceivable aspect of life in the capital from gladiators to aqueducts to the legal system, and secondly in reconciling Falco’s new-found respectability as a middle-class father of two with his dodgy occupation as an informer. The former is solved neatly - in these two books Davis gets Falco out of Rome by sending him on working holidays, first to the domestic port of Ostia and then to the ancient ruins of Greece. The latter proves to be more problematic and perhaps explains why neither of these books is really a satisfying mystery.
Scandal Takes a Holiday centres around the disappearance of Infamia, the scandal writer of the Daily Gazette (yes, ancient Rome really did have a prototype newspaper, the Acta Diurna), whilst on holiday in Ostia. Falco is hired by the Gazette to track him down and decides to bring Helena and the children. There is a plot involving kidnap, dodgy builders, Cilician definitely-not-pirates and dubious Illyrians, but at least in the first half of the book this is overwhelmed by the hordes of Falco’s and Helena’s extended families who descend upon them one group at a time. Whilst the familial shenanigans are entertaining (and we finally learn something about the Uncle Whom Nobody Talks About), they do seriously interfere in the pacing of the mystery plot. They also render implausible the actions of the baddies, who despite knowing all about Falco’s unsubtle investigations don’t do the obvious thing and threaten his family to make him go away. What’s more, Falco himself doesn’t even consider the possibility that they might. Granted, he is often pretty dumb, but such lack of concern for his nearest and dearest is completely out of character. Infamia’s interesting occupation is also rather thrown away. Still, the description of Ostia as a bustling port is wonderfully evocative and the final resolution does tie everything together.
Davis evidently realised the realism problems that having a vulnerable family were causing, and makes the very sensible decision to have Falco dump the kids on the maternal grandparents for See Delphi and Die. This is perfectly reasonable because it is Helena’s mother who instigates the action. Aulus, Helena’s truculent elder brother, has been packed off to Greece to further his education, but en route has become involved in an incident at Olympia where a young bride, one of a party touring the site, has been found dead. Aulus has linked this with the murder of another young woman at the Olympic Games three years before and has gone off investigating, prompting his mother to send Falco to put him back on the straight and narrow. So off he goes with Helena, his adopted and now pert daughter Albia, and, showing a more characteristic concern for his womenfolk than in the previous book, two of his young nephews and the athletic son of his personal trainer as bodyguards.
The story is an entertaining cook’s tour of Olympia, Corinth, Delphi and Athens. As always, the settings are excellent - I particularly liked the evocation of Olympia as a sort of seedy Venice Beach inhabited by body-obsessed athletes in training for the forthcoming games. The characters in the tour party, when we eventually meet them, are just as varied and eccentric as the real people I have met on the various trips that I have done. The real disappointment in this book is the murder mystery - it is quite obvious from even a casual consideration of the circumstances that there is only one possible suspect, and although there is a slight twist, the information that leads to it is only revealed just before the end. It has to be said, however, that the final scene is memorable.
So two slightly disappointing though still entertaining books. The problem, I think, is that Falco has nowhere to go now - he has achieved the highest status in Roman society that he plausibly can, and his increasing family responsibilities mean that the peril level and the ruthlessness of the baddies have to be pegged back, making these latest stories less satisfying than his earlier adventures. The best thing that Davis could do would be to ruthlessly prune some of the supporting characters, or - perish the thought! - disrupt the overly cosy relationship between Falco and Helena, but it’s clear that she has no intention of doing this. Still, I’ll keep reading them - it’s a cold, hard world out there, and we all need a holiday from reality from time to time.