Decius Cecilius Metellus is back in the third part of the adventures created by John Maddox Roberts.

After S.P.Q.R. and The Catiline conspiracy, Decius, 29 years old, comes back from Gaul in 61 BC. His family relationship with the influential Quintus Cecilius Metellus Celer has allowed him to gain office as quaestor in the garrisons of Narbonensis province. By leaving Rome a year, he began to soften the harsh relations that he was building with ambitious politicians, such Publius Clodius, the brother of the seductive but dangerous Claudia.

On his return to Rome, Decius’s first surprise is the gift of a purple toga he receives from his rude father, Metellus the Elder; the second is to learn that Clodius has not yet gone to Sicily to begin his new questorship.

But soon, the profanation of the mysterious Bona Dea night ceremonies leads the Senate to entrust Decius with a public investigation. Helped by Hermes, a resourceful slave, the situation turns out to be far more difficult than the young senator had ever imagined.

In this third novel, Roberts has lightened his style and increased his analysis subtlely.

Gaul readers will surely note the following example:
"I have spent the last year in Gaul, where the weather is awful and where inhabitants do not wash up. They eat badly, besides, and a thousand years of roman civilization will not succeed teaching them how to make good wine." (p.15).

The author's style is coming closer to Saylor or Comastri Montanari, both of whom have written about the same period. But in the end, if reading The Sacrilege is more pleasant --and it is-- who will complain?

Publius Memmius Albucius