Catilina's Riddle [Paperback]

The entire 'Gordianus' series by Saylor has to be commended as an inspiring blend of very accurate history and captivating murder mysteries. Catilina's Riddle however takes a special place within this series. While all the books deal with important political events in the last years of the decaying Old Republic, featuring all the well known and quite a few of the lesser players of the final Act of Res Publica Romana, the detective element of the books is very much in the foreground.
This makes the series very readable and exciting even for people with no or very little knowledge and interest in Roman history.

Catilina's Riddle however is different. The political upheaval during the year of Cicero's consulship, culminating in the attempted coup de etat by Catilina, takes the centre stage. This will undoubtedly lessen the appeal of this book to the reader for whom Rome and its turbulent history holds little fascination.
But anyone with interest in, let alone knowledge of, Rome in the 1st century BC will be entirely captivated by this splendid work. While the historical events are portrayed with meticulous accuracy, Saylor shows his tremendous insight into the subject matter by his masterful portrayal of Catilina. This enigmatic figure owes much of his posthumous reputation to the pen of his great adversary Cicero, who had ample reason to show him in not too favourably a light. Saylor tries to extract what might have been underneath the smear, so liberally applied by Cicero's brush, while carefully avoiding to invent or distort historical facts. The result is magnificent. Catilina emerges as a fascinating and tragic figure of great charisma, forced by the fates and his ambitions to play out the role history had set aside for him.

Gordianus' character is also further developed from where he was left of in the prequels, facing some trials of his own during the course of the story. The free flowing narrative, the well-drawn characters and the intriguing story line are all making this book anything but a dry historical work.

Comparisons are always difficult to make and controversial at the best of times, but I would venture so far as to say that this is the best Roman themed historical fiction since Robert Graves' 'I, Claudius'.

The Roman private detective Gordianus, called the Finder, seeks to flee the dangers and the corruption of Rome and retires with his family to a farm in the Etruscan countryside. But Rome won't let him go: his benefactor, now arch conservative consul Cicero presses Gordianus to become one of his spies in order to bring down an alleged criminal conspirator, the radical reformer Lucius Sergius Catilina. When Gordianus tries to refuse this dubious request, a headless body turns up on his farm. At first, Gordianus tries to solve the riddle of this "Nemo" (lat. for Nobody) and to steer clear of both the Ciceronian and Catilina's party. But soon, the powerful Roman elite leaves the hounded Catilina and his desperate supporters no way out except for armed insurrection, and Gordianus' family becomes drawn into this tragic civil and military confrontation.

Please note that "Catilina's Riddle" is not in the first line a mystery novel. It is a political thriller, a human tragedy and a colorful panoramic view of Roman society and politics that seems disturbingly up-to date. The book starts out slowly, so be prepared to give it time. It is, however, not too long. In fact, "Catilina's Riddle" ought to be longer than it is, because Saylor regretfully neglects to discribe in proper detail the social misery, poverty, enslavement and sheer human desperation that led to the uprising of Catilina. The historical sources about Catilina's conspiracy are very scarse, very biased and therefore highly contradictory in themselves. Cicero's speeches against Catilina are not much more than poisonous invectives of a conservative statesman against a popular reformer, and Sallust draws on them heavily in his book. Many writers that tried to tackle this historical material seem to accept Cicero's statements at face value, completely missing the fact that these speeches are not honest fact-based narratives but sharp political weapons that were intended to destroy Catilina's name and career, to drive him out of Rome and ultimately to get him killed. The results of wide-spread trust into Cicero's intergity are stories told straight from Cicero's papers, keeping in line with his political stance, including all the defamations and the slander that the anscient Roman orator heaped on his opponents.

Saylor's book is a wonderful suprise. The author does not only masterfully tell a tale that is riveting, powerful and moving but goes to great lengths to reconstruct the historical reality. When trying to put together a coherent version of the events of 63 BC, one must perforce arrive at the conclusions Saylor seems to have arrived at: that Catilina's cause was most just, and his alleged crimes probably never took place. Saylor's great historical novel moves one to tears by giving a glimpse of the truth.

I disagree with the other reviewer. This is actually one of the best in the series. I agree that it starts slowly and it can be difficult to get into it. However, the historial detail is superb and the story ultimately one of the most rewarding of the series.

It is also a very interesting take on a generally reviled figure, Catiline. Over the centuries, the general consensus seems to be that the man was a monster. The characterization of him in this book is delicate, ambiguous, and ultimately more realistic than the usual demonic portrayals.

If you know a bit about the period and are an intelligent reader, you'll enjoy this.