Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker (UK 2013)

From the Publisher:
WRITING FOR MONEY, PUBLISHING DEATH
AD74: it's a long, hot summer and Marcus Didius Falco, private informer and spare-time poet, is giving a reading for his family and friends. Things get out of hand - as usual...

The event is taken over by Aurelius Chrysippus, a wealthy Greek banker and patron to a group of struggling writers, who offers to publish Falco's work... olden opportunity that rapidly palls.

A visit to the Chrysippus scriptorium implicates him in a gruesome literary murder so when Petronius Longus, the over-worked vigiles enquiry chief, commissions him to investigate, Falco is forced to accept.

Lindsey Davis' twelfth novel wittily explores Roman publishing and banking, taking us from the jealousies of authorship and the mire of patronage, to the darker financial world, where default can have fatal consequences...

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker. A Marcus Didius Falco Novel. Arrow, ISBN: 9780099515173 (April, 2013), 368 p., £8.99.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker (UK 2009)

From the Publisher:
In the long, hot Roman Summer of AD74, Marcus Didius Falco, private informer and spare-time poet, gives a reading for his family and friends. Things get out of hand as usual. The event is taken over by Aurelius Chrysippus, a wealthy Greek banker and patron to a group of struggling writers, who offers to publish Falco's work - a golden opportunity that rapidly palls. A visit to the Chrysippus scriptorium implicates him in a gruesome literary murder so when Petronius Longus, the over-worked vigiles enquiry chief, commissions him to investigate, Falco is foced to accept.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker. A Marcus Didius Falco Novel. Arrow, ISBN: 9780099515173 (February, 2009), 353 p., £7.99.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker (USA 2002)

From the Publisher:
When the rich banker and publisher Chrysippus is murdered, Marcus Didius Falco must track a killer through the streets of ancient Rome, where a tangled web of lies, greed, betrayal, and sexual liasons awaits him, and he must race against time to discover the truth before he becomes the next victim.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker. A Marcus Didius Falco Mystery Novel. Mysterious Press, ISBN: 0446679062 (September, 2002), 372 p., $12.95.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker (USA 2001)

From the Publisher:
Lindsey Davis's mysteries featuring the Sam Spade of Imperial Rome, Marcus Didius Falco, are international bestsellers, with her vivid depictions of the Eternal City in a.D. 74 -- from the exalted oratory of the Forum to the blood lust of the amphitheaters. Now, in her twelfth novel, Davis sends Falco into a new arena, Rome's literary world, where the death of a publisher proves that ars longa, vita brevis...

Can a tough detective have the sensibilities of a poet? When street-smart Marcus Didius Falco is coerced into a public reading of his satires, he couldn't feel worse. Yet his scribbling is met with rousing applause... and an offer by Chrysippus, esteemed banker, patron of the arts, and scroll merchant, to publish his work.

Et tu, Brute! A euphoric Falco then discovers that Chrysippus expects to be paid for putting the budding author's work on papyrus. Falco is no Horace, but he has his pride. His ensuing altercation with the publisher makes him a suspect when Chrysippus is found brutally murdered - a classic body in a library. Fortunately Falco has an alibi, and thanks to his friends in the Watch, he also lands the job as the homicide's official investigator.

Murder, no matter how foul, is something Falco can handle even when he's up to his stylus in outraged authors and crafty bankers. But caught between family demands and pressure to wrap up the investigation, Falco relies on a time-honored method: He assembles all the suspects in the same room. He will need all his instincts and skills to find the one crucial clue that can break the case.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker. A Marcus Didius Falco Mystery Novel. Mysterious Press, ISBN: 0892967404 (July, 2001), 372 p., $23.95.

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker (UK 2001)

From the Publisher:
In the long hot Roman summer of AD74, Marcus Didius Falco, private informer and spare time poet, gives a reading for his family and friends. Things get out of hand as usual. The event is taken over by Aurelius Chrysippus, a wealthy Greek banker and patron to a group of struggling writers, who offers to publish Falco's work - a golden opportunity that rapidly palls. A visit to the Chrysippus scriptorium implicates him in a gruesome literary murder so when Petronius Longus, the over-work ed vigils enquiry chief, commissions him to investigate, Falco is forced to accept. Lindsey Davis' twelfth Falco novel wittily explores Roman publishing and banking, two fields with striking contemporary resonance and rich sources of satire.

The trail leads from the jealousies of authorship and the mire of patronage, to the darker financial world, where default can have fatal consequences...

Lindsey Davis: Ode to a Banker. Arrow, ISBN: 0099298201 (June, 2001), 352 p., £6.99.