In the opening volume of what is now a historical crime series spanning more than ten books, Decius, a low-ranking official at the very bottom of the Roman hierarchy, begins investigating the murder of a freed slave. The time: 70 BC, smack in the middle of the Roman Republic’s period of crisis. And guess who Decius runs into right in the very first chapter of The King’s Gambit? Bingo, you got it: the equally green and freshly ambitious Gaius Julius Caesar. Later on, of course, more famous faces from the era show up—everyone from Pompey the Great and Cicero to the scoundrel Publius Clodius Pulcher.
More of a Historical Novel than a Whodunit
Now, technically speaking, The King’s Gambit is a crime novel—it checks off a bunch of the genre’s usual boxes (forensic expert, informant, tough-guy sidekick)—but you still kind of feel like you’re reading historical fiction. The investigation itself is pretty thin, not particularly thrilling or original (there are moments when John Maddox Roberts rather clumsily uses well-known historical facts just to nudge the plot forward—hello, pirates), and most of the time it gets drowned out by long digressions into the political and historical dynamics of the day. Not least because young Decius becomes OBSESSED with the idea that he’s stumbled right into the middle of an anti-state conspiracy. And that everyone is out to get him. Um… what?!
A Conspiracy? Oh, Please.
That grand conspiracy claim eventually fizzles out and turns into nothing more than a plain old political scheme. Typical. But Decius doesn’t let go—he keeps digging into the case. No one understands why he’s MAKING SUCH A FUSS over a murdered slave. No one. Not even you.
The first book in John Maddox Roberts’s SPQR series honestly feels more like the pilot episode of a detective TV show. It’s a bit clunky, a little unsteady, but maybe not terrible—and you can’t help but hope the series eventually finds its stride.
It Feels Like You’re Actually in Rome
What definitely works in The King’s Gambit’s favor, though, is its setting, which feels completely authentic. For instance, I gave up on the similarly themed Gordianus series precisely because it lacked that feeling. It didn’t help that I had just finished reading Colleen McCullough’s epic Masters of Rome series, which made Gordianus fall flat by comparison.
Luckily, The King’s Gambit doesn’t suffer the same fate. In fact, quite the opposite. Almost every other paragraph drops in some piece of information so naturally woven into the text that it helps you better understand the political and civic backdrop of the time—or just makes you feel like you’re right there, tagging along with eager-beaver Decius through the cramped, stone-paved alleyways of ancient Rome.
Rating: 6.9/10
The King’s Gambit (SPQR #1) by John Maddox Roberts
274 pages, Paperback
Published in 1990 by Minotaur Books
—
You might also like:
The Fort by Adrian Goldsworthy
