"Macbain's debut novel convincingly re-creates everyday life in ancient Rome, weaving real and fictional characters with aplomb."— Kirkus ReviewsWhen the body of Sextus Verpa, a notorious senatorial informer and libertine, is found stabbed to death in his bedroom, suspicion falls on his household slaves—a potential death sentence for all.The cruel emperor, Domitian, orders Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus—known to history as Pliny the Younger—to in...

An old grudge erupts into violence as Odd Tangle-Hair refuses to back down from the men he believes shamed his father and betrayed their heritage by turning away from the old gods in favor of the White Christ. But when the violence escalates and Odd's family bears the brunt of it, he must leave his beloved Iceland behind and find his own way in the world. The golden age of Viking conquest is fading when he takes to the seas with his rag-tag crew, but they will voyage to primitive Lapland, ...

A turbulent frontier province, rotten with corruption and seething with hatred of Rome; a barbarian god whose devotees may include a murderer; a clever and unscrupulous faith healer who knows everyone's secrets; a boy who struggles toward manhood: these are the elements in Pliny's latest investigation.Newly appointed governor of Roman province Bithynia, Pliny finds a high Roman official murdered on a desolate hillside, miles from the capital. But as Pliny, far from Rome and the Emp...

The Varangian is the final entry in Bruce Macbain's Odd Tangle-Hair Saga and brings Odd's challenging adventures to a climactic and satisfying finish. On a secret diplomatic mission to the Emperor's court in Miklagard, the Viking's name for Constantinople, Odd meets the members of the fearsome Varangian Guard whose elite Viking members served as the Emperor's personal bodyguards. Harald, his former master and the man he's been sent to murder, now serves among the guards. Court int...

In this second volume of his saga, Odd Tangle-Hair travels to Russia to take up his post as skald to Harald, the young renegade prince of Norway. Intrigue and danger await him when Odd finds himself 'caught between two wolves'—the arrogant, bullying Harald and his sworn enemy, Ingigerd, Grand Princess of Novgorod, who schemes against Harald by seducing Odd. While political intrigue swirls around him, a Pecheneg horde explodes across the steppe, and Odd must use his wits to rescue the besie...

Rome, September AD 96. When the body of Sextus Verpa, a notorious senatorial informer and libertine, is found stabbed to death in his bedroom, his slaves are suspected. Pliny, a very respectable young senator and lawyer, is ordered by the emperor Domitian to investigate. However, the Ludi Romani, “the Roman Games,” have just begun, and for the next fifteen days the law courts are in recess. If Pliny can’t identify the murderer in that time, Verpa’s entire slave household will be b...

Sometimes murder is only a distraction from the real betrayal.Pliny, a respectable young senator and lawyer, is the newly appointed governor of Bithynia, a turbulent frontier province rotting with corruption and seething with hatred of Rome. When a high Roman official is found murdered on a desolate hillside miles from the capital, Pliny must untangle numerous threads in the investigation, including a barbarian god whose devotees may include a murderer, a clever and unscrupulous fa...

It was a summer of glorious triumph for the mighty Roman Republic. Her invincible legions had brought all foreign enemies to their knees. But in Rome there was no peace. The streets were flooded with the blood of murdered citizens, and there were rumors of more atrocities to come. Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger was convinced a conspiracy existed to overthrow the government, a sinister cabal that could only be destroyed from within. But admission into the traitorous society of evil c...

The year is 92 B.C. Gordianus has just turned eighteen and is about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime: a far-flung journey to see the Seven Wonders of the World. Gordianus is not yet called " the Finder"-- but at each of the Seven Wonders, the wide-eyed young Roman encounters a mystery to challenge the powers of deduction. Accompanying Gordianus on his travels is his tutor, Antipater of Sidon, the world' s most celebrated poet. But there is more to the apparently harmless old poet t...

Blackmail, corruption, treachery, murder—the glory that was Rome

In Egypt during the late Roman Republic, the young Gordianus finds himself involved in a raid to steal the golden Sarcophagus of Alexander the Great In 88 B.C. it seems as if all the world is at war. From Rome to Greece and to Egypt itself, most of civilization is on the verge of war. The young Gordianus-a born-and-raised Roman citizen-is living in Alexandria, making ends meet by plying his trade of solving puzzles and finding things out for pay. He whiles away his time with his slave Beth...

As the autumn storms of 1271 ravage the East Anglian coast, Crowner Ralf finds the corpse of a brutally murdered soldier in the woods near Tyndal Priory. The dagger in the man’s chest is engraved with a strange, cursive design, and the body is wrapped in a crusader’s cloak. Was this the act of a member of the Assassin sect, or was the weapon meant to mislead? Ralf’s decision to take the corpse to the priory for advice may be reasonable, but he is soon caught up in a maelstrom of conflict, ...