Book Review: Medicus by Ruth Downie

Looking for a book that combines mystery and humor in an ancient historical setting? Medicus by Ruth Downie is a great choice!

SYNOPSIS: Medicus takes place in Roman-occupied Brittannia. It follows Ruso, a military doctor at the hospital in the occupied town of Deva. He has recently been transferred to Deva from a post in Africa. He is recently divorced and is struggling, along with his brother, to keep the family farm and reputation afloat, as their father left them deeply in debt. The farm is located in Gaul, and while the brother and his family work to make the farm profitable and keep their creditors at bay, Ruso sends home as much of his salary as he can. On top of these stressors, he finds Britannia to be a backward, savage, dirty place. His lodgings are filthy and the food is terrible. The bureaucracy of the hospital, not to mention the military post, is in disarray; and Ruso has to perform the work of several men. His supervisor is a nosy, micromanaging creep with bad hair. He is kind of having a tough time, to say the least. Soon after the story begins, Ruso witnesses the terrible treatment of a slave girl, and before he knows what he has done, he has spent his badly needed money to buy and thus rescue her. In the meantime, a body has been found and identified as one of the dancing girls from the local bar. Later, another body is found, another girl from the same bar. Ruso, stepping outside of his responsibilities, finds himself swept up in investigating the murders and landing himself in plenty of frustration and danger in the process. Once he has healed her, he finds his new slave, Tilla, to be an invaluable help to him, not only in domestic life, but also in solving the murders.

GOOD STUFF!! This was an enjoyable read. I LOVED the sense of humor in this book. Even the pages introducing the cast of characters was funny and creative- I love how it was done. Ruso seemed to be a decent guy with a dry sense of humor, the girls at the local bar were fun characters, Tilla, the rescued slave girl, is intriguing and funny, Ruso's roomate is funny.... just great characters all around. The antagonists are despicable and (some of them) get what they deserve at the end. I loved the setting- obviously it's impossible to tell how accurate it was historically, but it was a great imagining of it. I don't know tons about Ancient Rome or Britain, and learned some things about the cultures. I appreciate that, despite the story largely surrounding a brothel, there weren't copious amounts of sexual content, and none of it was too graphic. I also liked how the book wrapped up. I believe it is the first in a series, but it stands alone quite well.

NOT-SO-GOOD STUFF: The story kind of dragged. I wasn't really swept up in the mystery; there wasn't much suspense or urgency to it until the end of the book.

TO SUM UP: This was a fun book! I don't know that I was impressed enough to read the next book in the series, at least not immediately. But it was worth the read. I gave it 3 out of 5 stars on Goodreads.

(Above image found at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8489416-medicus)