[Las Médulas Roman gold mines – all images author’s own]

As I write this blog we’re aboard a ferry, sailing home from Santander in northern Spain. We’ve been travelling through France and Spain for three weeks, uncovering so many Roman delights that I’m making over this newsletter to mention just a few. They may well influence a future Quintus novel I have in mind. [If you already follow the travel blog I co-write with my husband Peter, you’ll be getting more detailed posts about this trip; if not, here’s the link to our free blogsite: peteandjacmotorbikingineurope ]

For some time I’ve had a vague idea about a future Spanish adventure for my imperial investigators, Quintus and Tiro, ever since we visited Juliobriga in Cantabria on a previous trip to Spain. In fact, my short story Fool’s Gold, published in 2023 anthology Triumphs and Tragedies, is set in a little Roman town in Cantabria, Juliobriga, which really took my fancy. In that story I worked in a reference to the vast Roman gold mines at Las Médulas in Leòn, but did not then have the chance to visit the UNESCO-listed mines.

The notion of a novel-length story including some of the same characters lingered. But I needed to visit the mines for myself; I even made a few vague plot notes, and filed them in a folder named “The Spanish Emperor”. Then I put the idea on a back-burner, turning my attention to Bath (The Bath Curse, Quintus Valerius mystery #4 – coming soon), and later to Ireland (The Irish Slave, Quintus Valerius mystery #5 – slated for publication in 2027).

2026’s second heatwave intervened, upgrading that vague book idea into a must-do. We’d been travelling by motorbike since 4 June, disembarking in Dieppe to cool, rainy weather. We headed south towards the Pyrenees, intending to make for Barcelona and Zaragoza in NE Spain. By 11 June, we’d arrived in the Gironde area of coastal France, near Bordeaux. We visited a massive villa at Montcaret, near Bergerac, clearly the home of a very wealthy Roman. The same day, dodging heavy showers, we saw the scant remains of a Roman beach house at Andernos, which I instantly saw was suitable as a summer retreat for that same wealthy Roman. This house is one of a number of luxurious and highly desirable Roman summer residences along the coastline. There was even a handy beach where boats could be drawn up, potentially avoiding the customs officers in nearby Bordeaux. I began to get ideas…

As we continued south the weather changed dramatically, with overnight rises of at least 15 degrees C. The pleasant motorcycling weather turned to imminent broiling point. From Bayonne we dived into the French Pyrenees, figuring a couple of days in the mountains would solve the problem. But it just got hotter and hotter. By Monday 15th June, it was obvious that unless we were prepared spent the remainder of our trip skulking in the high Pyrenees, we would have to make a dash for somewhere else manageable. Our ferry home from Santander, on 24 June, was already booked. With the help of the excellent weather app, MétéoBlue, we found a narrow strip of Spain between the north coast and the mountains of the Picos and Asturias, forecast to remain safe to ride – in short bursts. That ruled out Barcelona, and anywhere else in NE Spain we might have fancied.

Sticking to the French Basque country and pausing in St Jean Pied de Port to paddle our swollen feet in the Nive river, we entered Spain via a densely foggy col. That night I realised that if we planned carefully, we could go further west into Asturias and spend the remainder of our time there. Las Médulas in northern León might even be within reach. We re-arranged our booked accommodation, set the alarm for an early start, and reluctantly took to the autovía to quickly skirt south of the Picos de Europa. Thus we arrived at Las Médulas. This is what we found.

The local Celtic tribe, the Asturs, had long been panning for gold dust in the nearby rivers. This was known to the Romans, who made a beeline for Las Médulas once the region was brutally pacified during the reign of Augustus.

Those spectacular images show the core remains of these mountains, all that is left after 250 years of Roman gold mining. Pliny the Elder recorded the hydraulic mining technique he called ruina montium, . He was a senior Roman official stationed in Hispania during the reign of Emperor Vespasian, and saw the process in Las Médulas with his own eyes. Long galleries were driven into the rock by miners (paid locals, most definitely not slaves; this was skilled work, as well as being dangerous). More than 700 kms of aqueducts and canals brought water from the surrounding area, gathering it into storage tanks above the mineral veins. Water was suddenly let into the prepared galleries, causing such hydraulic and compressed-air pressure on the ore-bearing conglomerate, that the rock was blasted apart. According to Pliny, the undermined mountainsides collapsed “with a crash which it is impossible for human imagination to conceive, and with an incredibly violent blast of air”. The water was then re-used to wash out and retrieve the gold dust.

It is calculated that some 10,000 miners worked at any one time, collecting in total some 1500 tons of gold over the two and a half centuries. The gold was used by successive emperors as the standard for Roman currency, without which the whole imperial project would collapse.

We also visited one of the little Hispano-Roman communities at nearby Orellán, a village of blacksmiths. These workers were specialists in making the iron tools used to support the mining. For me, this tiny community was more evocative than the ruined mountains themselves. I could feel the people around me as I walked their village: proud artisans, producing the tools that were their own key contribution to the Roman empire.

Holiday reading

Here are a few books I read between Roman sites and sweaty motorcycle rides, all recommended:

Death in the New Forest Linda Mather

I knew I would be in good hands with this latest crime novel by Linda Mather, and I wasn’t wrong! Midlands city detective Elinor Saxby leaves her complicated past for a fresh start amid the green trees and broad heaths of the New Forest. But those woods hide death and danger, and Elinor soon discovers the forest can be as threatening as city streets. An absorbing start to a promising new British mystery series. Recommended!

The Drowning Place Sarah Hilary

I downloaded this to take on holiday. Our trip nearly ground to a halt because I just couldn’t put it down, it’s such a riveting read. I loved Sarah Hilary’s new partner characters Laurie and Joe; the premise is genius and the action spine-tingling. A winning start to another new series.

The Midnight Train Matt Haig

Matt Haig is one of my all-time favourite authors. This new book follows in the footsteps of his phenomenally popular The Midnight Library, and has a somewhat similar structure. We witness newly-dead Wilbur revisiting his past in an effort to change the biggest mistake of his life. The story has charm, and will delight his faithful readership. For me, the similarity of structure with Library made the outcome a little too predictable. But still an enchanting holiday read.

The Burning Grounds Abir Mukherjee

I’m an avid fan of Abir’s Wyndham and Banerjee series, set in the fascinating and colourful India of the late Raj period. The whole series is a masterclass in historical mystery-making. This latest outing for the troubled Sam Wyndham, and his rapidly developing Indian colleague Suren Banerjee, is no exception.

My News

• Ledbury author event: If you’re within striking range of Ledbury library, and haven’t yet got your ticket for my crime writers’ panel event with Sarah Hilary and Linda Mather (see above for my reviews of their latest crime novels), here’s the link. We’ll be sitting down together to chat about all things crime writing. Doors are open at 6.30, so get your glass of wine and join us.

• New cover reveals

All four Quintus Valerius mysteries, including brand-new The Bath Curse, will be published by Sapere Books very soon. Here’s a taster: the brilliant new covers for The Governor’s Man and The Carnelian Phoenix. I’ll send out an alert as soon as they go on pre-order during 2026.

• The Salt Road: From Monday I’m back at work with a vengeance. The Salt Road will be the third investigation for Prefect Otto Cornelius and his deputy, Scaro. The research is done, following my recent trip to Middlewich in Cheshire with my Roman crime novel-writing mate, Fiona Forsyth – she whose Oxford University classics education is my secret weapon. More of our doings up north in my next newsletter. Meantime, you can check out her own series featuring the famous poet Ovid, in exile at Tomis on the Black Sea, here. Bet you’ve never thought of Ovid quite like this before!

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[Legio VI Victrix guards Tullie House museum, Carlisle]

I won’t say I rely on serendipity – but it happens often enough when I’m researching that I think Fortuna must have a soft spot for me. When our lovely friends Denise and Alan invited us to spend the May Bank Holiday weekend with them at Ullswater, in the Lake District, I mentioned I might like to whizz over to Carlisle to catch up on the latest research there. In the throes of what was then the long dark British winter, they agreed that a day in Tullie House museum would break up what would undoubtedly be a wet weekend. The archaeology world was agog with recent Roman findings in Carlisle (under Carlisle cricket club – how very English!) and I was keen to visit to see for myself.

Carlisle – Roman Luguvalium – was the site of early wooden forts during the initial Scottish invasion campaigns in the AD 70s, overlooking the confluence of the Caldew and Eden rivers, and guarding the Stanegate close to the Roman frontier. A permanent stone fort was rebuilt in AD 200, on the site now occupied by a later Norman castle. By this time the surrounding civilian settlement had become the capital of the Carvetii tribe. The city continued to flourish long after the end of Roman occupation, and has been identified as the court of sixth century King Urien of Rheged. St Cuthbert is recorded as visiting Carlisle in the eight century, and was shown the Roman walls of the city, and a Roman fountain still operational three centuries after the legions had left.

So Carlisle was long known as a Roman military garrison. But in 2017, all that changed when an inscription dedicated to Augusta Julia Domna was found. Controlled pandemonium ensued (you can read the details here). Readers of my third Quintus Valerius mystery, The Loyal Centurion, will know that Emperor Septimius Severus brought his strong-minded Syrian wife, Julia Domna, and their two sons, Caracalla and Geta, with him to Britannia in AD 208, on a determined but ultimately failed expedition to wrest Caledonia from those we now call the Scots. During their three years in north Britannia, the imperial court was homed in York (Eboracum), while Septimius and Caracalla and their huge army campaigned beyond Hadrian’s Wall. What I hadn’t known while writing that book in 2023 was that archaeologists working in the Uncovering Roman Carlisle project had established that Septimius Severus and the imperial family also spent several months in Carlisle.

The images above are among artefacts displayed at the Tullie House museum, all associated with the monumental Severan palace currently being excavated at Carlisle Cricket Club. The tile stamped “IMP” in a remarkably Arts & Crafts font is proof the building was built for the emperor’s use. I was especially thrilled to find the lion standard badge of a beneficiarius – though I was already planning a story featuring Carlisle to include Otto Cornelius, rather than Quintus Valerius. A nice problem – which of my two gorgeous MCs, Quintus or Otto, will get to go to Carlisle? More on that later.

Serendipity weighed in heavily at Tullie House, where we found the Sixth Victrix legion in charge on a glorious late spring afternoon. The soldiers were supported by amazingly knowledgeable civilians such as the Food Man, as we came to know him, whose wonderful spread of Roman foods kept us entranced.

We eventually tore ourselves away to take our hot dog (not hotdog) to the leafy surrounds of the dig site, at Carlisle Cricket Club. Here we were just in time to join a talk by archaeologist Paul, who pointed out the surviving wall of the huge Severan terrace-built villa, and demonstrated where the famous sandstone heads had been positioned to be seen from below. He also showed us piles of intaglio gemstones and hairpins retrieved from the drains, such a haul that only a spectacularly wealthy (and careless) gathering of Roman elite could have abandoned them here. (The QR code below does work – please support this remarkable dig. There is much more to be found in Carlisle!)

The next day, Fortuna still smiled on us. We walked from Pooley Bridge on Ullswater to Martindale, the site of the 13th century church of St Martin of Tours. The ancient yew tree in the churchyard is thought to have supplied the famous archers of Martindale with wood for their bows centuries ago. Inside the church I saw something even more remarkable: an old stone, which to my eye looked tantalisingly Roman (see image below).

The church’s dedicatee saint was himself Roman. Born in the fourth century to an army tribune, Martin also joined the army. He is said to have given away his red army cloak to a freezing beggar, and then became history’s first recognised conscientious objector when he refused to engage in battle in Germania. He later became a Christian bishop, and is the patron saint of beggars, soldiers, conscientious objectors, tailors, and winemakers. That seems to cover everyone.

The story goes that the stone, actually a Roman pagan altar, was found by the side of High Street, the famous “Roman road” across the nearby fells. It was moved to St Martin’s church, and has been used since as a font. The marks on the side are said to come from its prior use as a weapon sharpener. Whatever. I remain suspicious of the other marks, which look a lot like an inscription to me. Plus, according to the Roman Roads Research Association, there is little evidence that High Street was built by the Romans. So the mystery of the Roman altar stone remains – how delicious! How likely to lead to a story. Especially as I have already sent one Julius Candidus, tribune and old friend of Otto Cornelius to Carlisle in Otto #2, The Amber Goddess …

My News

• A reminder that I’ll be joining fellow authors Sarah Hilary and Linda Mather for a chat about crime writing, at Ledbury Library, at 7.00pm on 30th June. Tickets now available online.

• Before then, I’m taking a break from huddling in my writing hut, communing with invisible Romans. We’re away on our spanky new Royal Enfield Himalayan motorbike for three weeks travelling. First stop Dieppe on 4th June; after that, who knows? If you’d like to follow our adventures, you can sign up here for my free travel blog, peteandjacmotorbikingandtravels. I’ll see you there.

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For more about Jacquie’s writing and research, you can go to her Linktree for more about her books, articles, social media and Youtube channel.

[Images all author’s own. Here, the River Wye, from the Weir Garden]

At Swainshill just west of Hereford, on the north bank of the river Wye, lies the exquisite Weir Garden. Now cared for by the National Trust, the estate has for centuries been the site of a large gracious mansion and a 10-acre garden of great beauty. What a lovely country retreat!

Clearly our Roman ancestors agreed. Excavations since the 19th century have uncovered here the largest upstanding Roman remains in Herefordshire. The riverside remains were originally thought to indicate there had been a villa here; but recent research has suggested something much more interesting.

We first visited with our dog, Peggy, in summer 2023, expecting just a nice walk.

We soon realised what an exciting place the Weir Garden is. Obviously the Georgians weren’t the first to celebrate the natural beauty of this place. The Romans were way ahead of them. The striking octagonal stone cistern (below, left) and the large stone buttress (below, right, standing over 4 m in height) were uncovered in 1891 and 1977 respectively.

A pavement and painted wall plaster were also found, associated with a large terrace cut into the river bank. Masses of large stone blocks, thought to be steps leading to the river, have been identified, along with rooms, doorways and stone walls. Also an altar dedicated to Silvanus, god of the countryside (who is the subject of worship in my most recent novel, set further north in adjoining Shropshire).

Last summer NT archaeologists conducted more digs, looking for evidence of associated villa buildings nearer the known Roman road leading south to Abergavenny (where there was a Roman fort) and on to the legionary fortress at Caerleon. We made a special visit to the dig, hoping to find more of the purpose of the waterfront structures. Not much was uncovered, other than the sort of coins and artefacts that would be dropped along a road. We spoke to the lead archaeologist, who seemed to think the riverside buildings are the remains of an up-market watering place-cum-shrine, of the 3rd-4th century. But no obvious nearby villa has ever been found, which seems odd. My money, for what its worth, is on The Weir’s Georgian mansion, nowadays a care home, having extremely old foundations…

I went away feeling that spine-tingle I get when inspiration strikes. By the time we’d go back home, a nascent short story was forming in my imagination. In my head, the wished-for villa has sprung up in place of the Georgian mansion, with a well-paved path leading to the banks of the river. The wealthy owner, a man of substance with possibly dodgy connections, has issued “weekend in the country” invitations to a few select friends and acquaintances. The agenda is to eat, drink, swim, bask in the sun and visit the nymphaeum, all in the spectacular surrounds of his unique riverside leisure complex. But there is evil in the sunshine, and one of the invitees, or even the host himself, never goes home. Poor Quintus and Julia: you are among the elected visitors, and won’t be allowed home either, until the murder mystery is solved.

So far, so good. Death on the Vaga is beginning to take shape. But being the keen sleuths we are, my husband and I had first to check exactly which Roman roads would lead from Kenchester/Magnis (the Roman town near Hereford) to our riverside idyll.

(By the way, Vaga is not likely to be a Roman name but one given by later historians. It seems fitting to refer to the meandering Wye, so I am using it.)

Here we are, exploring the Roman road from Kenchester on our Royal Enfield Himalayan. Editor’s note: the Rider was wrong about Llandudno – he meant Llandrindod Wells. Mine is the tinny little voice from the pillion’s seat.

In a nutshell, this is how my research happens: something or somewhere sparks my interest, often serendipitously along the way; we go to site-walk; visit relevant museums; look at maps to ID likely Roman routes; then jump on the motorbike, both here and abroad, to explore the roads around. All of this feeds into my books, along with details of the landscape, orientation, plant life, skies, weather, and so on.

Just enough of all this research ends up in a story to give it colour. All great fun, and the research gives our meanderings a direction.

For more videos filmed at The Weir, go to my Youtube channel, Researching Roman Britain (scroll down to The Weir). There are dozens more videos there, which I updated last week to include video shot for my new Otto Cornelius series, set in Wroxeter Roman city.

My News

• Avoncroft Living History Festival, Bromsgrove 25 April

The gods smiled on me again this year, bestowing a magnificent day at Avoncroft Open Air Museum. I gave a talk about my research, met new readers, signed books, and enjoyed the company of people even more obsessed with history than I am. Introducing Vicus Romans, and their gladiatorial contest; here you see the retiarius whopping the secutor hands-down.

• UPCOMING: U3A Cotswold Link

  I’ll be presenting my research methods to a gathering of U3A groups across the region, at their literary event in Cheltenham on 2 June, From Pen to Reader: the Journey of a Book. Really looking forward to super-keen readers and interesting questions!

• UPCOMING: National Crime Reading Month at Ledbury Library

  Back with my old crime-writing muckers, Linda Mather and Sarah Hilary, to celebrate NCRM on 30 June. To join our panel chinwag, look out for tickets via Ledbury library in Herefordshire.

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For more about Jacquie’s writing and research, go to her Linktree to access her books and articles, plus links for her social media.

Short notice - especially for my readers abroad! - but I’m excited to announce I’ll be appearing next Saturday 25 April at the Avoncroft Living History Festival, Bromsgrove, Worcestershire.

I’m delighted to be back in my Roman costume, talking about my research and signing books. I’ll be one of a panel of authors, including distinguished historical novelist Kate Innes .

The grounds at Avoncroft will be bustling, with more than forty reenactment troupes from every period of English history, from the Bronze Age to WW11.

Do come along, and bring your family. I’d love to see you on Saturday!

Early bird tickets available still.

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Way back when (last week), Spring tried to happen here in the Malvern Hills. I’ve shared some snatches of it in the image above of our flowering currant shrub, and the birdsong I recorded on my walk (press Play button above).

That was clearly misleading and premature. Since then Winter has stormed back, literally, with hail, snow showers and blustery cold winds. Today I woke on the first day of British Summer Time to grey clouds, freezing winds, and showers, adding insult to the injury of being taxed an hour’s sleep for the privilege. Plus ça change.

But never mind the British weather; there’s still something to celebrate at this time of new beginnings. This weekend I’ve submitted my second Otto Cornelius Roman mystery, The Amber Goddess, to my publisher, Sapere Books. Before that, it’s been extensively frowned at by my First Reader, AKA my husband Peter. He isn’t easy to please, so I was relieved when he signed the book off. After making me re-write the fight scene in chapter 20 at least half-a-dozen times. So fussy!

Goddess has simultaneously gone off to my stalwart beta readers, a group of loyal readers and fellow authors. They’ll be letting me know if the book actually works. Thank you in advance to any of them who are reading this!

This story takes Otto and Scaro deep into the hows and whys of the murder of a wealthy businessman on his estate, Villa Sterna, not far from the Romano-British city of Viroconium Cornoviorum (Wroxeter). Along the way, what seems at first sight to be a family matter becomes much more complex. By the end, Otto realises that he has become embroiled in a continuing plot, that reaches back into his own past as Legion Prefect at Deva fortress (Chester). That sets us up nicely for the third in this series, The Salt Road.

But before I re-open my exhausted laptop to begin that tale, I’m taking a short break. We’re going away for a few days to celebrate our joint birthday next week, in the little Welsh Marches town of Montgomery. Here I shall eat, drink, walk, and sleep long and well, I hope.

[image: montgomery-wales.co.uk]

As winter merges into spring, and endings inevitably lead to new beginnings, I’m going whet your appetite with an excerpt from the prologue, the very start of The Amber Goddess; I hope you’ll find it intriguing!

“Sabbatius rode his tired horse back out of the city, crossing the river Sabrina to headwest. He pushed the gelding as fast as it would go. Dusk was falling and sweat had soaked into his tunic when he finally saw Rhiannon’s horse on the dim road ahead. She was miles beyond the river crossing, moving at a steady trot towards the village of Mela. Even in the gloaming he recognised her upright seat and supple carriage. At his hoarse call, she tugged on the reins to turn the mare. Their baby was quiet, bound tightly to her by a plaid shawl.

Sabbatius dismounted awkwardly. His wife always made him feel inferior on horseback – which he was, of course. Rhiannon, native-born, had all the equestrian skills of her namesake: the Brythonic goddess of fertility and strength, also called Epona of the old people, who conferred sovereignty through her choice of mate. But not this time, he thought as bitterness rose in him. He tried not to show his anger, as he held out his hand to her.

‘Rhiannon. We must talk.’

She sat still, watching him. He detected no unease in her expression, none of the shame an absconding wife should display on being caught. She gazed at him with unfathomable eyes. Her auburn hair was caught into a knot at the neck, spilling down her back. She had put aside her matronly Roman clothing, and was dressed in a soft green homespun gown gathered round the waist by a leather belt, under her gathered plaid. Hanging from her neck on a thong was the amber amulet she always wore, carved with the sign of her native goddess. He was uncertain how to address this proud young woman — his woman. And yet, what reason had she to look down on him? She slid off the mare. Even the grace of her movements angered him now. But she grasped his forgotten hand, still extended.

‘Very well, Sabbatius. I am listening. Speak.’

He found he could not hold her steady gaze, no matter how much he had rehearsed the justice of his feelings. He looked instead at the dimly-seen ground, feeling rejected and inconsequential. Despite his extensive Roman education, his three languages, his rapidly increasing business and social status in the city; despite all the long proud history of his Hebrew ancestors, at this moment he felt small. There was no better way for her to rouse his ire, just as the Emperor Hadrian’s sacrilegious attack on Jerusalem had roused his worthy ancestors. In their rage his people had destroyed a Roman legion, declaring their own state of Judaea. Sabbatius was likewise infuriated at Rhiannon’s unfairness to him. He had been true to her since their marriage, working long hours to provide for her. Like his forefathers, he would take no more humiliation; he would make a stand. He swallowed the painful knot in his throat to speak.

‘You are mine. Your place is in my home, caring for our child; being a dutiful wife asyou promised when we wed. You will come back with me now.’

She made no move, remaining silent for a long moment. Then she looked pointedly ather hand, still grasped in his, before she spoke.

’When we agreed to take each other, it was not by your Roman process. You knew that. We were handfasted according to the ways of my people, for a year and a day in the old British style. That was the price I asked in return for leaving my home and way of life. I was willing to accept you as my husband and live with you in your Roman city, because of our agreement. I at least have honoured that. You said then that you understood and would accept the terms.’

‘But now we have a child! We are married still.’

‘No. You knew when we wed that either of us could end the arrangement at this time, if we did not both desire to make it permanent.’

‘No!’ He spoke louder than he intended, and the baby at her breast stirred, making abrief peevish protest. He forced himself to take a deep breath. ‘No. I, your sworn husband, wish the marriage to continue. You are my wife. I love you! You are bound by honour. You cannot take yourself and the child away on a mere whim.’

She let go his hand, stepping back. Her expression hardened. ‘But I do not wish to extend the marriage term. You are not the man I thought when we wed. You’ve changed, Sabbatius. You are obsessed with your business. The gaining and keeping of Roman silver is all you care for. Too often you’ve left me alone, in a city where I have no place. I am not your possession. I, Rhiannon of the Ordovices, am a free woman after the law of my own people. Our marriage agreement is ended. The child and I will rejoin my family, my tribe, where I may choose a different husband. That is also our law.’

She turned to leave. He grabbed her…”

Next time I’ll be talking about AI; planning; and what’s coming up for me and my writing later this year.

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[Image: Grosvenor Museum]

What a scene! The legionary fortress of Deva Victrix, as portrayed in the fabulous Grosvenor Museum in Chester. This huge fortress was the home of the XXth Valeria Victrix legion from the late first century AD, continuously occupied till the early fifth century. As we discovered during a research visit in December, Chester retains some of the best-preserved Roman remains in Britain. At the time of our visit, it was also playing host to the Gladiators of Britain exhibition, during its national tour of the UK. Roman Chester and British gladiators are both planned to feature in my upcoming novels. More on that research trip below. (The exhibition runs till 31 May 2026, so there’s still time to see it – highly recommended.)

My News

But before we drool over the gladiators, I have news, and a treat to share. (I’m very excited about this, so forgive the news pushing its way to the top of my newsletter!)

Last week I signed a new contract with my publisher, Sapere Books, for five Quintus Valerius mysteries. That’s to include re-issues of The Governor’s Man, The Carnelian Phoenix, and The Loyal Centurion, all with spanky new covers, re-edited and inclusive of maps, cast lists, place names, etc.

On top of that, there will soon be two brand-new adventures for Quintus, Tiro and Julia: The Bath Curse, and The Irish Slave. Only the Irish book remains to be written; those of you with retentive memories will remember my research trip to Dublin, Drumanagh and Tara of the High Kings, in September 2024. That book is planned in detail, and will come out in 2028.

Before that, the third of my new Otto Cornelius mystery series – working title The Salt Road – will be published in 2027, joining The Silver Mirror and The Amber Goddess.

All publication dates will be released, with pre-order links, on Substack and my social media channels.

Free novelette prequel to the Quintus Valerius series

Back in May, inspired by our trip to Pompeii and Herculaneum, I wrote a story based on bodies recovered from the excavated beach at Herculaneum. To welcome new subscribers to this newsletter, I’m offering my story of the AD 79 eruption exclusively to you. I’ve made it a distant prequel to The Governor’s Man, but it’s a standalone story, full of drama and heartbreak. Here’s a little taste: the opening scene of A Night Blacker and Darker.

Opening A Night Blacker And Darker

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To read the rest of this new story, absolutely free, just hit the Subscribe button below. (If you’re already a subscriber to my Substack newsletters, don’t worry – the whole novelette is already waiting in your email inbox.) I hope you enjoy the story.

Back to the gladiators and the legionaries.

I’m going to get into trouble for the sleeping man pic on the right, but here goes: Deva Victrix/Chester was built on a prominence above a curve in the Dee river. The fortress layout followed the standard paying card design, with one mysterious difference. Look next to fig. 5 on the diagram – that Elliptical Building (sadly demolished by the council in 1967, to build a carpark!) is unique. It consisted of 12 compartments, set round an oval courtyard with fountain, all made of fine stone at the earliest phase of construction. Its purpose remains unknown. I am left mulling over how it will contribute to a future Otto Cornelius story; but it will!

The sleeping man is standing in front of the Roman docks wall in Chester, now guarding only the Chester race-course. The Dee has shifted its course significantly over two millennia, leaving this magnificent wall unlapped by any waters.

The hypocaust of the fortress bathhouse (left) can be viewed in the basement of 39 Bridge Street; more baths remains are at the Roman Gardens, near the amphitheatre. Speaking of the amphitheatre, here is a modern reconstruction, by the sleeping man, of a fight between a Roman gladiator and a Briton (not really):

And now for the gladiators.

The altar to the goddess Nemesis was found in a little shrine just inside the amphitheatre. The amphitheatre itself was built for the legion, but given recent research showing much coming and going between the military and civilian populations in Roman Britain, would no doubt have been a great centre of entertainment for everyone. Gladiators are known to have travelled from across Europe to come here. They were not always slaves (pace Hollywood!); some people even volunteered to fight in the arena. Apparently there was some sort of enticing sex appeal associated with the vocation…

The helmets in the centre (original and reconstructed) show that design of gladiator armour was more for effect than practicality. Not how I would want to be protected.

Finally, the panel on the right shows a likely fate if you were a slow or fat gladiator, or a prisoner condemned ad bestias. On being fat, by the way, recent research finds that gladiators were fed a carb-heavy diet, mostly barley, intended to add layers of fat. The fat offered some protection against sword slashes, while allowing for spectacular bleeding. Useful to know for Quintus Valerius mystery #6, The Dead Gladiator, to be set in London. When I catch my breath.

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Jacquie’s short stories, magazine articles, social media, and Youtube research videos can all be reached on her Linktree. Links to her new and re-issued books will be added at pre-order date.

[Storm clouds over British Camp, in the Malverns]

January is never the easiest of months, is it? The lights and family celebrations of Christmas have been and gone; the New Year’s parties are over; all else is dark, cold and accompanied by viruses. I was brought up in tropical Queensland, so a British January makes me want to dive back under the duvet till February (keeping company with the regulation Christmas cold; mine was a champion, thanks for asking).

Last January I was anticipating the return of President Trump, and vaguely wondering what Project 2025 might mean. I think we all know now. Watching the newsreels and social media from Minneapolis, Gaza and Ukraine continues to be horrific and soul-destroying. But I’m not going to write about politics in this newsletter. There are journalists and pundits far more qualified than I am. I’m more concerned with how such stormy times affect the world’s writers, and therefore their readers.

Turkish-British novelist and essayist Elif Shafak wrote just last week in her Substack, Unmapped Storylands (25 January, 2026):

Things are falling apart. Writers, poets and readers, we do not live in a vacuum. It affects us all, this frightening and fast zeitgeist. No one understood this better than Gustave Flaubert, the ultimate introvert. In a letter to his dear friend Turgenev he said that, all his life, he had tried to live in an ivory tower, a place of solitude and simplicity, but with wars, violence, hunger and so much suffering everywhere things were changing.

[Image credits: Isabella De Maddelena; Suki Dhanda; Murdo MacLeod]

Ukrainian writer Andrey Kurkov said in an interview (Nicholas Roe: 10 February 2024) that he had been 70 pages into a new novel when he and his wife had to flee Kyiv, ahead of Russia invading their country. For many months, he says, he couldn’t write fiction, instead delivering a stream of writing about the war. Long after returning to Kyiv, he still found “it felt too guilty a pleasure to write fiction in a time of war. It was like being imprisoned by reality, checking the news every hour all day, and then waking up several times a night to check it again.”

Orange prize-winning novelist Linda Grant says of her fiction-writing during the second Covid-19 lockdown in the UK [the Guardian, 19 February 2021, article by Alison Flood]

I can’t connect with my imagination…I can’t connect with any creativity. My whole brain is tied up with processing, processing, processing what’s going on in the world…My subconscious is just basically screaming: ‘Get us out of this…I don’t have the emotional and intellectual energy to give to these shadowy people to bring them out of the shadows.

During the same period, author William Sutcliffe tweeted about his struggles with his next book: “I was inundated with responses from other authors who were struggling”.

So, the first thing to realise is that during traumatic times, many writers struggle to be creative. If you’re a writer finding your mind a blank, or failing to get your word count down, you are definitely not alone this winter (whichever side of the pond you’re on). We are living in unprecedented times – interesting times, as the Chinese curse terms it. Writers tend to be more sensitive to the world around them than most, despite spending many hours working alone. So we shouldn’t be surprised that being worried, tense or anxious affects our work. It just becomes much harder to get into that desirable flow state, one where we become productively lost in the world of our characters and stories.

Every writer develops their own way of dealing with stress and anxiety, but when doomscrolling becomes a time-sucking diversion, we might need to remind ourselves of coping mechanisms that work for us – and really commit to them. For me, having a structured routine helps. I write Mondays to Fridays, noon till dinnertime. I spend weekday mornings reading the paper; a cooked breakfast, supplied by my husband; walking the dog for an hour or so; doing yoga; dealing with correspondence; and getting the nitty-gritty domestic tasks done.

[This was my therapeutic walk on 16 January]

Lately I’ve added another technique, which I’m trying really hard to apply – turn off the phone after dinner. Instead of scrolling, I meet friends in the pub, knit, watch escapist TV (currently Badehotellet on Ch 4, highly recommended!), and listen to my husband play guitar. I read fiction in bed, at least an hour before sleep. That last one is critical. The nights I sleep badly are the nights I’ve been on social media till my eyelids droop. Don’t do it! Everyone, writers and readers, needs an off-switch. My advice: find your off-switch, and use it every day.

Book reviews 2025

I’ve already featured some terrific new books over the past 12 months. Here are snapshots of three more books I loved in 2025, not necessarily new ones.

Stone and Sky by Ben Aaronovitch

Ben Aaaronivitch’s latest full-length Rivers of London outing takes his copper Peter Grant on a busman’s holiday north to Aberdeen, with his river goddess wife and twin daughters. Needless to say, occult crime involving murder and the offshore oil industry takes place, and Peter learns much about how Police Scotland operates. As always, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith does a superb job with the audio version. If mermaids, selkies and police procedurals are your thing, you’ll love this!

The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo

This mystery is an intriguing blend of history, folklore and fantasy. It’s set in northern China at the end of the Imperial period, and follows the quest of a shape-shifting fox, Snow, who has suffered terrible losses and is determined to seek revenge. Her path interweaves with a detective trying to solve the murder of a courtesan left to freeze to death. I found the story initially a little slow to get into, but once I had found my way into the unusual setting and culture, I really enjoyed it.

Fairybridge by Martin Booth

Written by a friend of mine, Martin Booth’s slyly observant tale of local authority politics and mismanagement takes us back to the Nineties. His hapless hero, architect Michael Maby, finds his dream commission to design a new civic centre being caught up in a mesh of local bigwigs, jealous colleagues, and small-town corruption. Martin is himself a retired architect, so we won’t ask where the inspiration comes from… Let’s just say Tom Sharpe would be proud to have written this scalpel-sharp satire.

My News

Books: If you’ve been looking for my Quintus Valerius series on Amazon recently, you’ll have noticed only paperback versions from my previous publisher are currently available, mostly secondhand. This is because my new publisher, Sapere Books , is re-launching the Quintus series. We’re working on new cover designs and layout of all the three existing titles; plus soon there’ll be a brand-new fourth Quintus mystery, The Bath Curse. Alongside those, my new Otto Cornelius series will be launched during the summer, beginning with The Silver Mirror. The next in that new series, The Amber Goddess, is nearing completion. I expect to begin writing the third Otto book, The Salt Road, by April.

So there’s plenty to look forward to. I’ll be sharing the covers as soon as they become available, and of course let you know launch dates for all seven books.

Meantime, I still have some stock at home. If anyone fancies a signed Quintus Valerius mystery, complete with map and cast list, I can send them out on request (UK only); write to me at jacquierogersauthor@gmail.com

Author events: the diary for 2026 is beginning to fill up. I’m talking to University of the 3rd Age (Cotswold Link), on 2 June in Cheltenham. My recently acquired Roman replica shoes will get an airing along with my Roman lady costume, and I’ll be modelling new Roman earrings (a Christmas gift from Peter, my First Reader aka husband.)

NCRM June: as ever, I’ll be supporting local libraries for National Crime Reading Month. I’m thrilled to again be joining super fellow crime-writers Linda Mather and Sarah Hilary in a panel event at Ledbury Library, on 30 June. I’m also in discussion with Malvern and St John’s libraries in Worcestershire, for live events. Dates to come soon.

As 2026 is National Year of Reading, I’ve decided to offer my support to any regional groups – reading groups, schools, libraries – during this special year of promoting reading. I’m always happy to talk about Romano-British history, crime writing, my research, and writing books. Just drop me a line if you’re interested.

Jacquie’s books, short stories, magazine articles, social media, and Youtube research videos can all be reached at her Linktree.

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[Saturnalia fun, as portrayed in Pompeii]

From their first colonies in the new province of Britannia, our Roman ancestors brought their gods and celebrations here. That caused the partial suppression of ancient seasonal rites practised by the native Britons, (though, as I discovered while researching my latest Otto Cornelius mystery, The Amber Goddess, Celtic traditions like Samain (Halloween) persisted in rural areas.) The Roman festival of Saturnalia, celebrated from 17-23 December, thus replaced winter solstice feasting and preceded Christmas during the pagan Roman centuries.

In the UK, and in Western cultures generally, we derive many of our traditional celebrations of midwinter from Saturnalia. Some of those Roman traditions—including giving gifts, wreaths on doors, singing, lighting candles, feasting and merrymaking—became absorbed by the traditions of Christmas as we know them today.

As this is my final Substack for 2025, I have two treats to offer you. First, a taste of Saturnalia here in Britain: an excerpt from my third Quintus Valerius mystery, The Loyal Centurion; the scene takes place in York, that mighty Roman city and longtime home of the VI Victrix legion. I should warn you – there are dark moments in the midst of the festivities!

Extract About Saturnalia

178KB ∙ PDF file

Download

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[If you’re dying to know what happens next, here’s the link to The Loyal Centurion. Available in paperback or for Kindle, from Amazon.]

And now…how to curse, Roman-style. Still with the dark theme, you can read all about Roman curses from Fiona Forsyth: prolific and super-talented author of the Ovid Roman mysteries, and a genuine Classics scholar. AKA she to whom I run when needing a tricky translation!

Guest author blog by Fiona Forsyth: The Wonderful World of Roman Curses

[Lead curse tablet found at Castle Cary, Somerset. It’s a petition to the god Mercury, asking him to recover property, including cows, stolen from the petitioner’s home.]

As the most magical time of the year approaches (Saturnalia of course!), what could be better than a brush-up of our cursing skills?

Fortunately, here in the UK we have a treasure trove of material thanks to several sites where springs of water were associated with the worship of a powerful god or goddess – most famous is that hot spring which bubbles away in Bath in Somerset, Aquae Sulis as the Romans called it, curses have also been found in Uley, Lydney, Leintwardine, Carlisle…

Because the spring was sacred to the goddess Sulis Minervae, many people felt that a direct appeal to her could do their enemies a lot of harm and so we have discovered over a hundred pieces of lead, carefully inscribed with a variety of crimes, and the punishments the worshipper would like to fall upon the villain. This is not limited to Roman Britain; it happens all over the Roman Empire.

Do you need to curse someone? Let’s begin by gathering what you need.

The material for your curse does not matter as much as some might think – yes, lead is popular, but pewter and papyrus are perfectly acceptable. Even a normal wax tablet would do, but for something a little more permanent, melt the wax away and scratch directly onto the wood.

Since we are in Britannia where lead is plentiful, we shall stick to lead. Yes, I know it’s not very health and safety, but you are cursing someone, so that probably isn’t the foremost issue in your mind. Take a thin sheet and find a nice, sharp,pointy thing with which to scratch out your curse.

1. First choose your deity. Sulis Minerva is the obvious one if you are near Bath but if you are near the shrine of Mercury at Uley, you could look to the god of travellers, merchants and thieves. Mars and Nemesis are popular choices and in Athens, one outraged citizen took no chances and called upon Cerberus the hound of the Underworld.

2. Next we need a verb – commonly used is “dono” meaning “I give (to the deity)”. Alternatively, you could first call on the god and then curse the person using the verb “devoveo”.And don’t feel you have to use Latin, as gods, through their superior abilities, are quite able to read English.

3. Now the name or description of the person being cursed. Often, it is clear, the people writing these curses did not know an actual name but they knew what the villain had done. We find “thief” (furem) mentioned quite a lot or a description “the man/woman who… …” (eum/eam qui).

4. You do not have to write down what crime has been committed, but people often did. In practically all British curses so far deciphered the crime is theft. Clothes, jewellery, money, a ploughshare, and in one famous Bath curse, the writer’s girlfriend, Vilbia – all half-inched by evil-doers.

5. You can, if you wish, drop a hint to the god as to what you would like to happen to the evil-doer. Insomnia is mentioned often, but you could also consider liquefaction, an infestation of maggots, an inability to urinate and loss of blood.

6. Add some magic words to intensify the curse, such as bazagra or berebescu.

7. Done! Roll up your lead sheet and if you fancy being especially vindicative drive a nail through the rolled-up lead. Then ceremoniously throw it into the spring. I’m sure the god or goddess will be delighted.

Notes:

DO: write the curse backwards to impress your deity.

DON’T: kill any puppies or kittens. They do that elsewhere in the Empire, but we don’t need that here.

DO: add a drawing of something suitably grim if your talent stretches that far. The gloomy ferryman of the dead, Charon, would be a good subject.

DON’T: worry too much about the purity of the Latin, if you choose to use it. You are Celts, after all, nobody expects the grammar and vocabulary of Ciceronian Rome.

Below I offer a specimen curse, in Latin and English. Feel free to adapt it to your own needs.

Minervae dono eum qui anulum volavit sanguinem fundat bazagra berebescu

Translation: I give to Minerva the man who stole my ring. May he pour out his blood, bazagra berebescu

If you are now a confident curser, why not try writing your curse in the cursive script you would use in normal Latin writing? It isn’t like the nice regular letters we are used to from inscriptions in stone and there are only nineteen letters as the Latin alphabet was not as large as ours. But I’m sure you ingenious cursers can adapt!

Fiona Forsyth has never knowingly cursed anyone. She is the author of six novels set in Ancient Rome and the third in her Publius Ovidius mysteries, starring the infamous Latin love poet Ovid, is out soon.

Follow Fiona at Amazon and on Substack.

Thank you, Fiona!

I can’t top that lesson; something to add to your New Year resolutions, perhaps? And on the subject of curses, the next mystery in my Quintus Valerius series, The Bath Curse, has much more about curses, death, and even the fate of Vilbia. Coming soon from Sapere Books.

So that’s it from me for 2025. I do hope you’ve had a wonderful midwinter celebration, and wish you all that’s happy, healthy and harmonious in 2026. See you then.

Jacquie’s books, short stories, magazine articles, social media, and Youtube research videos can all be found at Linktree.

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I walk – a fair bit. As regular readers know, I’m lucky enough to live in the Malvern Hills in England, with access to dozens of routes from my front door. (I stopped counting at 37 different pathways.) My dog Peggy, She Who Must Be Obeyed, demands an hour of hillwalking daily, so out we go in rain, hail, fog, snow, or extreme heat (yes, we too are getting ridiculous summer temperatures).

Like most of us, I generally take my mobile along for the jaunt. But no! I’m told in a barrage of recent media articles that this is a really bad idea: bad for my health, both physical and mental, bad for my well-being, bad for my creativity.

A posse of worthy and well-meaning writers are now extolling the benefits of mobile-free hiking. Such as better posture, a more natural gait, and the avoidance of accidents and injury. I had no idea that carrying a phone could possibly put my life at risk, but of course better posture is worth considering. I did wonder what kind of phone the journalists concerned are lugging around, to have their posture ruined and be at risk of accidental injury. This type, perhaps?

[Vodaphone VM1: image from techcentral.co.za]

My husband, AKA First Reader, used to hump around a device like this in the 80s as a senior engineer at BT. Dear Reader, lighter models are also available.

But it gets worse. Carrying a phone in the great outdoors, shrieked another article, threatens your cortisol levels, befuddles your mental clarity, and risks your natural sleep-wake cycle. Not to mention annoying other walkers.

I presented all this evidence to my telecoms-addicted husband. He looked strangely at me. ‘I think you are confused,’ he said. ‘You will trip up and break your arm, not to mention rotting your tiny brain, and nevermore sleeping, if you walk on the hills whilst using your mobile.’

Oh. And there I’d been for the previous 30 years, phone zipped firmly into my pocket, tramping through bog and briar, over hilltop and along mountainside. I’d held to the mistaken belief the lethal device might just save my life, in the unlikely event of my getting lost or collapsing somewhere remote. All this time I naively thought I was enhancing my creativity by taking pictures of the scenery (while stationary, with both feet planted firmly).

But the dire warnings persisted, and I decided I should heed them. Thus on Saturday, when the First Reader had disappeared off with other tech-friendlies to spend the day communing with motorcycles at the NEC, I donned mountain coat and boots, hitched up the dog, and ventured out into the wilds. Alone, naturally, leaving my (admittedly very light) iPhone at home. Just me, Peggy, and the wild free drizzling rain/fog.

Now you’re wondering exactly which dire event overtook phone-less me, aren’t you? Did I get lost in the dripping cloud, doomed to wander forever in the wild like Cathy in Withering Heights? Or did I finally meet with that disastrous accident, to lie undiscovered in the bracken, with my pleas for help fading inexorably till only my bleached bones remained?

No. It was worse than that. With only whiteout and a diminishingly perceptible dog to focus on, my mind began to wander. It’s a professional weakness, like a carpenter smashing his thumb with the hammer. Leave a writer alone, and she fantasises. As I wandered lonely as a cloud, inevitably thinking about my current novel (The Amber Goddess, now nearing 40k words, since you ask, and a damned complicated plot), it came to me. The whole ending of the book. All the loose ends unravelled and tied up, sub-plots sealed off.

Friends, I panicked. My noble resolve to improve my health (mental and physical), my posture, my mental clarity, my creativity for goodness’s sake, meant that when that longed-for inspiration struck in the midst of a whiteout on top of Perseverance Hill, I had nothing – NOTHING – to record it with.

At that moment my dog proved her worth. As I cursed and wept, she did her canine business in the verge. Distracted, I reached for a poo bag in my pouch. And there, winking up at me, was my blessed iPhone. Never has a denouement been more rapidly recorded (as an audio file. I couldn’t trust my frozen fingers.)

So I’ve take on board all the well-meaning advice, and made a firm resolve. To never, ever, walk anywhere without my phone. The consequences of being without it are much too dangerous.

Guest author blog by Alistair Forrest

Alistair Forrest has four novels published by Sapere Books – Libertas, Sea of Flames, Vipers of Rome and Line in the Sand. A journalist, editor and historical fiction author, he lives in the Channel Islands with his wife Lynda Adlington, an illustrator and children’s author.

Better a tipsy sailor than a meticulous engineer

I’ve been wondering recently whether I am a freak author. Worrying, I know, as no one wants to be considered a freak.

I’m pleased to report that I’m no such thing. Probably way too ordinary, as it happens.

You see, I actually did the normal author thing and plotted all three books in my soon-to-be-published series, The Britannia Conspiracy. The intention was to have someone close to Julius Caesar observe his missions to subdue the Brits in 55 and 54BCE.

Caesar himself chronicled his entire Gallic Wars campaign so it shouldn’t be hard to write the stories from a military standpoint. We know the beginning and the end of his Britannia campaigns and much of the middle bits. Easy peasy?

I started the series a couple of years ago and promptly lost the plot, so to speak. What appeared on my screen bore no relation to my carefully crafted outlines. I should have known this would happen. True to form, as with my four existing novels, the new stories had a will of their own and the characters guided me as I went along.

Caesar doesn’t get much of a look-in. Instead a Rome-educated Gaul, a wronged priestess, a gay Roman writer, and the madcap crew of a Celtic trading ship (skippered by a piratical woman) emerged to take over the stories. Add to these a wolf rescued as a cub from Roman hunters who killed his mother for her fur, ragtag ancient Brit outlaws, and the dawning realisation that Ceasar’s writings are at best dubious.

The result? Nothing like the original plots.

I’ve recently read Lee Child’s Reacher – The Stories Behind the Stories and I was delighted to discover the same approach, albeit with a zillion more book sales than I’ll ever achieve. Apparently, not once did he know where his many fast-paced Reacher novels would go even as he wrote the first line.

I might as well not bother telling my publisher what I intend to write because it never works out like that. The only time I had a rough idea of the ending of a book was Line in the Sand, but everyone has a rough idea of how the story of David and Goliath pans out, although my characters have even managed to fudge that one.

The award-winning British/Turkish writer Elif Shafak has a theory about this. “Broadly speaking, there are two different ways of writing novels,” she says. “The engineer likes to plan everything well ahead whereas the sailor, who is a bit tipsy, starts from a place of not knowing.”

She lets her characters guide her, “and I love it when they surprise me.” I can vouch for that feeling.

Another book that has appealed is Terry Pratchett’s biography, A Life with Footnotes, written by his literary assistant Rob Wilkins. Pratchett likened his writing to a ‘Valley of Clouds’. Sitting on a hilltop overlooking a fogbound valley, he could see the destination on the far side but to get there he had to descend into the misty valley floor and travel in roughly the right direction. By the time he arrived at the other side, everything had changed.

I’ve decided I’m not going to worry about being a tipsy sailor as opposed to a meticulous engineer and accept that I’m not a freak after all. Now, where’s the Captain Morgan rum?

Find out more at alistairforrest.com and subscribe to his free newsletter at alistairforrest.substack.com.

Jacquie Rogers’ published books, short stories, magazine articles, social media, and Youtube videos can all be found at her Linktree.

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This month I’m moving right across the Roman empire, over 1500 miles due south to Hispania Baetica (nowadays known as Andalusia). Our plan was to visit family and friends, and enjoy some late summer sun. Son Daniel and his family now live in Málaga, where we began our trip on 3rd October; we ended it with a wonderful extended lunch in pretty Mijas with good friend and fellow Roman author Alistair Tosh, and his lovely wife Jenny. Ali is the author of the Edge of Empire series set in Roman Britain. He’s now writing a new trilogy about the second Punic War, for Sapere Books.

In between we spent a week on a hired Triumph Tiger motorbike, exploring the south-east of Andalusia. Now comes the disclaimer: this post is not about Roman Britain, and as you’ll discover, not entirely about the Romans in Spain. As we travelled, we went further and further back in time – all the way back, discovering what is now thought to be the most ancient continuously inhabited city in western Europe.

But we begin in Málaga, or Malaka as it was called by its Phoenician founders. The Phoenicians were of course legendary traders and colonisers, who founded this trading port on the western Mediterranean in the 8th century BC. Their cousins the Carthaginians followed, running the increasingly prosperous city till they lost the Punic Wars to Scipio Africanus in 218 BC, when Malaga and later all of Spain became Roman.

From Málaga we went uphill and inland to Antequera [in feature image]. In terms of overall longevity, Antequera has a good claim to be a winner, as we discovered when we visited the UNESCO World Heritage Bronze Age dolmens. They are oriented for viewing sunrise at the solstices over a nearby anthropomorphic landscape feature, La Peña de los Enamorados. The engineering and construction skills needed to build these dolmens over 5.500 years ago are truly staggering.

Antequera later became a Roman town (of course), then changed hands through Visigothic and powerful Moorish rule, till the 15th century reconquista.

I’ve written a lot more about the Moorish and Mudèjar towns we visited in my sister travel blog . For now, let me take you further into pre-history, to the magnificent city of Úbeda. This was furthest point of our short trip, a city we know and love from a previous trip in the Noughties. It was then most famous for its wonderful Renaissance architecture, having been largely rebuilt during the time of Charles V, cousin of our very own Catherine of Aragon. By that time, Úbeda had already been Iberian, Carthaginian, Greek, Roman, Visigothic, becoming the major centre of Ubbadat Al-Arab, and then the border (in the upper Guadalquivir valley) between the Moorish kingdom of Granada, and the Christian kingdom of Castile.

We came back to stay two nights because of a pioneering extended programme of archaeological research here, revealing that Úbeda has been occupied – without interruption – from the Copper Age to the present day. That is a period of six thousand years. During all that time people lived here, initially to farm, create copper metallurgy, and thrive, on the very spot where the Moors built their citadel in the 8th century AD, and now archaeologists continue to dig. This UNESCO city stretches our understanding of urban life back into the mists of time.

Guest author blog – Ben Bergonzi

I’m so delighted to introduce you to Ben Bergonzi. Ben is known thoughout the historical fiction world as Reviews Editor for the Historical Novel Society. Now he’s taken the next step with his debut historical crime novel, A Cruel Corpse. Published by Holand Press, the fast-paced tale of murder and danger in 18th century Carlisle is out now in paperback and ebook.

Here is Ben in his own words about his novel’s background:

‘No-One Sees Past the Uniform’

A Cruel Corpse by Ben Bergonzi

Visiting a regimental museum over 10 years ago, I happened upon the historical figure Hannah Snell, a British female soldier in the 1740s. Thinking of the genre of historical crime, I conceived of a female detective who could adopt either male or female roles at will and so use her disguises to investigate crime. She would be a soldier called Hayden Gray (because Hannah Snell used the name James Gray). Confident in her deception, she would say, ‘No-one sees past the uniform.’ Hooked by this notion, I researched other female soldiers and sailors who confounded the era’s rigid division between male and female, and all its rules of rank and behaviour. I found there were several cases of women who wore breeches every day, and were more or less believed to be men. After all, the eighteenth century was the one time when men were invariably clean shaven and either wore their hair long or used wigs.

Having tested Hayden out in a short story which did well in a competition judged by the crime writer Howard Linskey, I then sat down to write the novel. I had to go through several iterations of voice and backstory before I could start on page one with both my female soldier on duty in the army and with the murder victim already dead. To solve his murder, she has to turn detective so as to protect her own secret. I ‘trickled in’ her backstory via flashbacks, helped by the decision, in rewriting, to depict important scenes from other characters’ viewpoints.

I took from Hannah Snell’s biography the city and castle of Carlisle, an isolated setting and one which, as my story starts, is still recovering from having been the only English city occupied by Jacobites in the 1745 Rebellion. The postwar setting, of garrison soldiers suddenly at peace but falling out amongst themselves, appealed to me with memories of the great book and film Tunes of Glory.

And so eventually, after years of work and many doubts, I arrived at my first published novel (there have been others.) A Cruel Corpse as finished is not a discussion of transvestism, nor indeed a book solely from the female point of view, but is a crime novel first and foremost. I think the eventual outcome is suspenseful, vivid and reasonably fair to the history.

[Ben with the Colonel and Hannah]

About the Author -Ben Bergonzi

After a varied career in education and heritage, including spending time as a museum curator and as a manager of historical document digitization, Ben now works mainly as a reviewer and writer. He is a Reviews Editor for Historical Novels Review. Born in the north of England, he has spent most of his life in the midlands and the south; currently he lives with his family on the cusp of London and Chiltern Hills. His days as a re-enactor are long behind him, but he often remembers them while writing.

Jacquie’s October News

16 October: Tregolls Lodge Book Club

It was such a pleasure to revisit my friends at Tregolls, by the magic of Zoom. They really turned out for me, very flattering. One day I hope to visit in person, but the trek down to Cornwall is longer than I can do just now! I spoke about how I came to write my historical fiction, and was rewarded with an enthusiastic reception and interesting questions. Thank you, Tregolls and your indefatigable book club organiser, Howard Embery.

Jacquie’s published books, short stories, magazine articles, social media, and Youtube videos can all be found at her Linktree.

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Last week the UK had the unusual felicity of a second state visit by President Trump of the USA, with his wife and entourage. Much of the president’s three days on our soil were deftly hosted by King Charles III, cosily confined inside the hospitality of Windsor Castle, thereby justifying the Civil List for some appreciable time to come.

During the royal banquet held in the Castle, President Trump complimented his host, the king, and his realm. In a mesmerising soliloquy that ranged through the king’s fortitude and nobility, Trump’s admiration for the radiant Princess Catherine of Wales, gardening and tree planting, and architecture, the president alluded to the king personally uplifting the UK poor, and tending veterans “like no-one else”. (Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole both spring to mind, but let’s not be churlish).

The king seeks to put the “great back into Great Britain”, his guest enthused. Not into Northern Ireland clearly, but at least Trump’s Scottish mother would have approved.

Mt Trump then went on to talk about the common language that divides our two great nations. English, he proclaimed, was born in these isles, being perfected by our greatest writers. Included in the list were — in no particular order — Shakespeare, Dickens, Tolkien, Lewis, Orwell and Kipling. These writers are united, said Mr Trump, by being uniformly “incredible and unbelievable”. I wish I’d used that phrase in my English Literature A level exam. Who knows what higher mark I might have achieved?

Great praise from our closest friend and ally in this troubling world. So it’s a real shame the UK is “going to Hell” along with the rest of Europe, as Mr Trump explained to the UN five days later. I guess when he opened his party bag over the Atlantic on his way home, he must have been disappointed.

Or —- maybe someone who has actually read the works of Shakespeare, Dickens, Orwell, etc has now explained to the president what really unites these authors across four centuries. Shakespeare, for example, in the Scottish play, gave us a portrait of a leader with violent ambition who comes to a sticky end. Dickens campaigned endlessly for social reform, including education and children’s rights. Orwell, of course, was a lauded social critic, famously opposed to all forms of totalitarianism, both communist and fascist. I wonder whether Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four have continued to slip under the radar of the Republican-run states?

Kipling could be held to be an exception, having been criticised for his beliefs in Empire and the white man’s burden. But despite his shortcomings as an imperial apologist — fairly standard for his time — Kipling was very alive to the growing menace of fascism, attacking Oswald Mosley, Mussolini and Hitler in the 20s and 30s.

As for Tolkien and Lewis, this is where we come back to the Malvern hills (my video above). Both of them Oxford dons, they frequently walked the Malvern hills, being close friends of George Sayer, headteacher at Malvern College. It is said the stony spine of the Malverns inspired the White Mountains of Gondor, in Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. In the Narnia books, one of the most-loved children’s series of all time, Lewis expounded on the debt Christian belief owes to shared concepts of universal morality. For his part, Tolkien, whilst explicitly denying LotR as an allegory for WW11, championed the small people who — like the Hobbits — when roused would “shake the councils of the mighty”. His writing was imbued with themes of courage, hope and the fight against evil, and how moral choice wins over brute force.

Something for the Republican party, the tech bros, and ICE members to consider, when — as I am sure they will — they play back the speeches at Windsor Castle, pondering the take-home message.

There’s more from me at the end — a quick whizz through some of my summertime reading.

***

Guest writer’s blog - Val Penny

Now for something much more entertaining, as I introduce the first of my autumn guest blogs: the pacy plots, contemporary Edinburgh setting, and resilient characters of prolific American/Scots contemporary crime writer, Val Penny. Here she is writing about how she keeps her characters fresh and dynamic. Enjoy!

Keeping Characters Dynamic

Thank you so much for inviting me to your site today, Jacquie. It is lovely to have the opportunity to be in touch with your readers and tell them about my new book, Hunter’s Secret and some of the characters who tell this story.

I only started my writing career after I had been treated for breast cancer and took early retirement. Who would have thought that something so devastating would lead to such an exciting new job?

I write crime fiction, particularly because that is the genre I enjoy reading and when I began my first novel, Hunter’s Chase, I always knew that I wanted the novel to be the first in a series (although each book can be read on its own) and therefore the characters would need to advance, mature and change while their story-lines develop to retain my readers’ interest.

In order to do this, before I start writing I create full biographies and back stories for all my main characters. This allows me to know not only what they look like but what they like to wear, what they choose to eat and drink and how they spend their leisure time. Even more important is that I know how each of my characters will react to the variety of different difficult and unpredictable situations that I create for them.

My readers do not need to know every detail about the different characters, but it is important that I do, and that I share the information necessary to my readers as each story unfolds.

Let me take Hunter Wilson as an example. He is a son of the manse, in other words, his father was a church of Scotland minister so, although Hunter is not particularly religious, he was taught the difference between right and wrong from an early age. My readers are also familiar with the fact that he drinks good quality black coffee and not instant coffee most of his team drink. He enjoys pub grub from his local bar where he plays darts and likes going out for Indian meals with his partner, the pathologist, Dr Meera Sharma.

Hunter’s relationship with Meera has developed over the series so far from the admiring glances he snuck during Hunter’s Chase to one of the secrets he is withholding from her in the next book to be released, Hunter’s Secret.

Most importantly, readers have to know that they are able to trust Hunter to do the right thing, act fairly and to keep Edinburgh safe.

Hunter’s Secret: The Blurb

Detective Inspector Hunter Wilson is called to the scene of a murder. DCs Tim Myerscough and Bear Zewedu have found a corpse, but when Hunter arrives it has disappeared, and all is not as it seems.

Hunter recalls the disappearance of a dead body thirty years earlier. The Major Incident Team is called in but sees no connection – it is too long ago. Hunter is determined to investigate the past and the present with the benefit of modern DNA testing.

Tim has other problems in his life. His father, Sir Peter Myerscough, is released from jail. He, too, remembers the earlier murder. There is no love lost between Hunter and Sir Peter. Will Hunter accept help from his nemesis to catch a killer?
Hunter’s own secret is exciting and crucial to his future. Will it change his life? And can he keep Edinburgh safe?

The Author

Val Penny has an Llb degree from the University of Edinburgh and her MSc from Napier University. She has had many jobs including hairdresser, waitress, banker, azalea farmer and lecturer, but has not yet achieved either of her childhood dreams of being a ballerina or owning a candy store.

Until those dreams come true, she has turned her hand to writing poetry, short stories, nonfiction books, and novels. Her novels are published by SpellBound Books Ltd.

Val is an American author living in SW Scotland. She has two adult daughters of whom she is justly proud and lives with her husband and their cat.

Author Contact Details

www.valpenny.com

https://www.facebook.com/Authorvalpenny

www.facebook.com/valerie.penny.739

www.facebook.com/groups/296295777444303

https://www.facebook.com/groups/167248300537409

https://twitter.com/valeriepenny

***

Jacquie’s summer reading

Real Tigers and Spook Street by Mick Herron

I gobbled down books 3 and 4 of the fantastic Slow Horse series, hastened along by the imminent launch of the screen version of book 5, London Rules (last night on Apple TV). Even without that incentive, couldn't help myself. These books are pacy, addictive and so exceptionally well-written. If you can read this series any other way than back-to-back, you have my admiration.

Blackout by Simon Scarrow

I’ve been a fan of Simon Scarrow’s Roman historical fiction for many years. Despite that, I managed to miss the launch of his WW11 Berlin wartime thrillers, and have been scrabbling to catch up. In this sizzling start to the series, we meet Inspector Horst Schenke, get to know him and his distinctive and satisfying team, and start to realise what a mismatch he is for the new Nazi regime he’s forced to operate under. Oh, what a cracker! And there’s more to come…

A Schooling in Murder by Andrew Taylor

Again, an author I revere, whose previous Ashes of London 17th century crime series I’ve really enjoyed. Andrew’s research is meticulous, and his characters well-drawn and constantly falling into jeopardy. No more so than in this stand-alone wartime murder mystery, set in a third-rate girls’ school in rural England. The protagonist couldn’t be in a much more perilous situation, being — spoiler alert — dead at the outset of the book. Despite this apparent handicap, she is determined to track down her killer, and by a clever authorial sleight-of-hand, she strikes up a partnership in an intriguing way. The whole premise very much appealed to me as a murder mystery writer, I can tell you. A fun read, despite the rations and dingy school setting.

And…

All Roads Lead to Rome: Why we think of the Roman empire daily, by Rhiannon Garth-Jones

A bit of a cheat, as I’m still reading this new historical account exploring not the history of Rome as such, but tracing the empire’s enduring legacy. From the Byzantine empire (during which the citizens continued to call themselves Romans), to the Holy Roman Empire, and on to much later empire-builders like the British, French and even Americans — all have drawn on the legacy that is Rome, and modelled themselves on Rome’s institutions and mores. I’ll give you a more considered review anon. I may be away some time.

Jacquie’s published books, short stories, magazine articles, social media, and Youtube research videos can all be reached from her Linktree.

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[The Death of Chatterton, by Henry Wallis, modelled by George Meredith.]

George Meredith’s 1862 poem, Modern Love, is a novella in poetic form dealing with the demise of a Victorian marriage. It’s all about emotion, and Meredith clarifies this by showing how the couple’s feelings drive the action of this ultimately tragic story.

You may not think this has much to do with creating a murder mystery. It’s said that Agatha Christie started all her novels from the murder, choosing the killing method, then the murderer, then the motive. The Writers Digest team boils down writing a mystery to a loathsome victim, a closed environment (think island, isolated country house, a resort in the Bahamas), a litter of clues, and a puzzle for readers to solve.

Other crime authors live or die by spectacular premises, like Janice Hallett’s trademark epistolary works (featuring emails, texts, social media, as does Robert Galbraith’s Ink Black Heart); or settings so deadly they act as another suspect, like Jane Harper’s Australian mysteries; or shattering twists, as per Gillian Flynn in Gone Girl.

Anthony Horowitz, successor to Conan Doyle in writing Sherlock Holmes novels, says he often spends longer planning a book than writing it. But amidst all the carefully detailed planning is his core technique: the reason why A murders B is C — the relationship between them.

I’ve been pondering all this while planning my sixth Roman mystery, (working title The Amber Goddess). I should explain: I’ve switched around my plans for Otto Cornelius books 2 and 3, saving the Droitwich tale for next year. So the second in my Otto series is now set in an impressive villa neighbouring Wroxeter Roman city, in Shropshire.

Confession time: unlike my five earlier Roman mysteries, this time I have no iconic artefact to inspire me, no famous assassination, no inscrutable inscription, no imperial edict. All I have is an idea of the kind of mystery I want the story be. Plus the vague geophysics outline of an unexcavated villa found last year in the grounds of the National Trust’s Attingham Park. So no real hook for my new story. That also means no start — nor end — to navigate through the story. Let me show you what I mean by that:

In each of my previous books, before I began to plan I already knew either the beginning, or the end, or both. So in The Governor’s Man, I knew about the lead mining fraud, and the silver hoard found in a burned-down Somerset villa. The Carnelian Phoenix was designed to end with the uber-dramatic palace assassination recorded by historian Cassius Dio (spoiler alert!) The inspiration for The Loyal Centurion was a genocidal command by dying Emperor Septimius Severus. The fabulous lead tablet curses from the Sacred Pool of Bath gave me both the beginning and end of The Bath Curse (forthcoming). And in The Silver Mirror (to be published next spring/summer), I couldn’t avoid the amazing Wroxeter mirror, found by archaeologists in the gutter of the Viroconium forum and now on display in Shrewsbury museum. All of these gave me plot routes, steering my Roman sleuths into mystery and danger, and out towards solution and safety.

I’ve realised this through subsequent (bitter) reflection. Without a suitable prompt to hand this time, from either history or archaeology, I’ve been flailing for weeks. I failed to move the new book beyond scrawled notes (torn up), repeated fruitless forays into my research on Wroxeter, and much coffee-drinking and prevarication. I even strayed away to write two short stories, one of them almost novelette length. (That story will be pressed into useful service at some future date.) But it didn’t solve my immediate problem.

Another prevarication was a long slow rabbit-hole down into Roman law, specifically family and inheritance law. Useful research; not a story outline. I was going nowhere, and meanwhile my careful writing timetable was being trashed. On Monday this week, after waving goodbye to friends who’d come for the long weekend, I made myself a promise. Whatever happened, I would break through this impasse the next day. That would mean doing something radically different.

Back to Meredith. I’d been so intent on planning the basic way stations of my plot that I’d overlooked the power of characters to act autonomously. I’d been relying on having a story outline in place to tell my characters what to do. Now I decided to let them, or their “passions”, spin the plot instead. So I set aside my outline document, and turned to developing the people of the story. Some I already knew: Otto Cornelius, long-serving Roman army officer turned official sleuth; Scaro, his semi-retired blacksmith friend; Vedica, Otto’s childhood playmate, current love interest, and manager of the posting inn in town; and an array of other friends, relatives and servants from the first Otto story, The Silver Mirror. Some of these would carry over into The Amber Goddess, of course, but other characters would be needed.

Fellow Roman writer Daniel Colter recommended Writer’s Guide to Character Traits to me, and I now turned to my secondhand copy. I began with my first victim, the autocratic head of a wealthy family. Victorinus Lucius is hiding two big secrets, and between them they create the necessary suspense. Next, I gifted him a range of potential murderers. Armed with my newly-acquired legal knowledge, I quickly created a suffocating circle of jealous relatives and resentful hangers-on, all with reasons to want Victorinus gone.

Ooh, I thought, this is working! The process of developing my characters was giving me all the motives I could ever need. Those personality traits even handed me murder methods, which in turn suggested red herrings and a trail of clues leading back into the city of Viroconium itself.

By the end of Tuesday I had nine new characters, all apt enough for murder to give Otto and Scaro a real headache. Deep joy! The story begins — and that’s all I need for now. I know enough to trust that the people of the story will now drive it forward.

Fingers crossed the September dig at my chosen villa site doesn’t throw up anything too awkward…

[Attingham archaeology: image credit NT Images/James Dobson]

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My August News

• The Weir

We returned to this unusual Roman site in July. It’s set along a particularly beautiful part of the Wye river, near the Roman settlement of Kenchester in Herefordshire. I’ve been saving this location for a future short story, in which a rare holiday for Quintus and Julia is spoiled by — you’ve guessed it — an untimely and mysterious death. Here’s a couple of video snippets from our recent visit. Please forgive the Roman coronet supplied!

The dig I mentioned in the video clip found little in the adjoining fields to indicate any associated Roman settlement, though they did uncover some hobnails, ceramics, a spoon and a bronze brooch. More work needed? (If you like our videos, click below on my Linktree for much more.)

• Ross Book Festival, 17 August.

This was an inaugural book festival for the market town of Ross-on-Wye in Herefordshire. It was well-organised in a cool spacious venue, with some 30 authors of all genres attending. I sat between poet Elizabeth Cathie and fantasy and crime writer PR Ellis, and despite the heat outside we all had a very enjoyable afternoon. A steady stream of keen readers browsed and chatted with us, and I sold enough books to warrant a return next year. An excellent addition to the Marches book fair roster.

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Theakston Old Peculiar Crime Writing Festival, July ‘25

If you’ve read any of my Roman Britain novels, you’ll know they are, in the words of surprised US reader David Hoover, “detective stories set in Roman Britannia!”

They’re also works of historical fiction, a genre whose challenges I’ve frequently discussed in my newsletters. (At the moment I’m working with fellow Sapere authors on a proposal for a panel session at the Historical Novel Society’s 2026 European conference.)

I’m therefore a hybrid author, with a foot in each of the historical fiction and crime fiction camps. Fortunately the differences seem to matter more to publishers and booksellers than to readers and writers. The delightful consequence is that in either sphere, I can meet like-minded people, and relish the company of enthusiasts and greats alike in either camp.

And so to the 2025 apogee of crime book festivals, the Theakston Old Peculiar Crime Writing Festival, rightly described by its chief sponsor as “world’s longest-running and most prestigious celebration of crime writing”. At a time when AI has the world of publishing in chaos, and many prestigious literary festivals are flailing around in search of funding and sponsorship, Simon Theakston was a reassuring presence to open the 2025 festival. Simon was on stage along with programming chair, spy thriller superstar Mick Herron — and a line-up of the dark nectar itself. Along with a generous, and heavy, array of crime fiction for delegates to take home in goodie bags.

This was my first year at Theakstons. It’s been held since 2003 in the famed Old Swan Hotel at Harrogate, Yorkshire. If that rings a bell, you’re right. The Old Swan was where Agatha Christie famously took refuge when she disappeared from the public gaze in 1926. It’s the perfect venue, dripping with atmospheric character and large enough to house an events marquee for 700, and the huge Drinking Detective tented bar.

Because we crime writers (and readers) have reputations to live up to, you know. Never mind scribbling alone 360 days of the year, in attics, kitchens, coffee shops or garden sheds (in my case). Come July, we switch personalities. We come to Harrogate with our hardboiled, cosy, noirish, and sleuthing faces to the fore, licences to kill in our pockets. Good times will be had, if it kills us.

I arrived on a torrid Thursday afternoon in time for the annual awards presentations. I was secretly barracking for Abir Mukherjee’s new thriller Hunted, and was both smug and pleased when it carried off the coveted Novel of the Year award. The delightful and talented Elly Griffiths was honoured with 2025’s Outstanding Contribution to Crime Fiction award. Best of all was the terrific after-party, little of which I can remember. (I do recall the polite and understanding young Irishman who I burdened with my views on Brexit. Apologies, Declan/Rory/Padraig, and thanks for the cider.)

And so it went on, for another three days. It turns out that crime writers — once freed from their garret shackles — are the most convivial people on the planet, and their readers are amongst the most knowledgeable and enthusiastic of booklovers. I had previously noticed these benign characteristics among my local Malvern Crime and Coffee library group; I now know they are universal traits. As for the writers, I have never seen so many giants of literature as genial and relaxed as they are at Harrogate. Not just on the stage, or when signing books, but in the beer tent, at the author dinners (special thank you to Emma Christie who hosted my table), and all around the Old Swan grounds. Genuine warmth and approachability was the order of the day.

The whole place was heaving with the biggest and best names in the business. Among the highlights for me were events featuring AA Dhand; Nick Harkaway; Louise Doughty, Mick Herron (several times over — where does he get all that energy from?); Mark Billingham; Irvine Welsh, interviewed by Abir Mukherjee; New Bloods Daniel Aubrey and RS Burnett, both names to watch; Sarah Hilary; Ben Aaronovitch; Chris Hammer; Kate Atkinson in conversation with Lee Child; Janice Hallett and John Finnemore; and the incomparable Queen of Crime herself, Val McDermid, was omnipresent.

I met dozens of other writers and readers, all a joy to spend time with. Special shout out goes to Aussie/Lancs Liz, whose sleuthing powers secured for us the Mick Herron mystery dinner table prize, a coveted Waterstones token each.

Going home was quite the letdown after such an extraordinary long weekend, but I comforted myself with placing an early bird booking for Theakston ‘26. I’ll be back.

I was left wondering why we read and write crime. By some estimates, crime fiction has become the most popular genre in the UK. The more difficult and challenging life and the world in general becomes, the more popular crime reading is. Why? here’s what I think:

• It’s engaging. People are fascinated by other people’s lives, and crime offers the broadest possible perspective on people and their behaviour, including the darkest aspects of human psychology.

• It’s suspenseful. Crime novels, whether it be a cosy full of retired colonels and elderly spinsters in a Cotswold village, or an urban noir with a demoralised detective chasing a vicious serial murderer, or even a high concept thriller, with the fate of the world hangs on the lonely endeavours of an overlooked scientist — all of these are narratives full of cliffhangers, twists and turns, red herrings and increasing tension. Crime novels are page-turners.

• It’s about justice: right winning out, and baddies getting their just desserts. We all love the satisfaction of Poirot fingering the culprit, and Moriarty paying the price for evil.

• It’s brain-teasing. The whole premise of crime and thriller fiction is to set the reader a puzzle, engaging the little grey cells to solve the crime.

To judge by the talent on display at Harrogate, writers also flock to the genre. Which brings me back to PD James. As she said, crime writing is an exercise in bringing order into a chaotic world. The detective is presented with a fragmented conundrum of one or more crimes. She is challenged to seek justice for the victims, and to prevent worse happening. He has to overcome doubt, confusion and fear to resolve dilemmas, and bring back peace and equity. Whew! No wonder we all love a good crime story.

My July News

• The beginning of July found me and my chauffeur/cameraman/First Reader Peter Rogers in Shropshire, on our latest research trip for the new Otto Cornelius series. We returned to Wroxeter Roman city, where I chatted to English Heritage’s site manager, Kirsty Matthews. Kirsty quickly sharpened up my grasp of the layout of the sizeable Romano-British city of Viroconium Cornoviorum. (It is comparable in extent to Pompeii, for those of you who’ve trudged that city.) We discussed other vital aspects like which merchants sold goods on the upper storey of the covered market; what is under the Victorian farmhouse on site; and whether the Roman road south from Chester (Deva) to Droitwich (Salinae) would have run through Wroxeter (answer: yes.) In case you’re wondering, Salinae comes into Otto Cornelius #2, which I’m beginning to plan in August.

• Then a quick dash to Attingham Park, a National Trust estate where a Roman villa has been very recently discovered. (That villa has taken my fancy, and may feature in Otto #3.)

• Next day saw another great privilege. I spent a whole morning in the erudite company of Dr Roger White of Birmingham University, one of the leading scholars and archaeologists in the country. Roger has worked on archaeological digs at Wroxeter and its surrounding settlements and forts for many decades. He’s also co-author of the definitive report of the Wroxeter Hinterland Project. He was very generous with his time, and answered so many of my questions, I feel I know Viroconium inside out now. Let’s just say any mistakes in the forthcoming first Otto Cornelius mystery, The Silver Mirror, will be down to me.

• Reminder of the Ross Book Fair, Sunday 17 August, 12-4.

  I’ll be with a group of authors at the Larruperz Community Centre in Ross-on-Wye, chatting to readers and signing my Quintus Valerius mysteries. I’ll bring along limited copies of the new historical short story collection, The Ring, in aid of a wonderful literacy charity, The Reading Agency. Do come along for chat and a browse.

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Jacquie’s books, short stories, non-fiction articles, social media and Youtube videos can all be reached from her Linktree here.

[Image Hadrian’s Wall, Creative Commons]

There’s a lot of confusing talk around of ceasefires, truces, and brokered peaces. It’s noticeable that amidst all the claims and counterclaims, there seems little prospect of actual peace between Israel and Iran. Or Russia and Ukraine.

The existence of modern instantaneous communications, alongside faster-than-sound projectiles might make it more tempting for a warring nation to break a supposed truce, getting in a sneaky blow. Apparently, even when a superpower claims ‘the ceasefire is unlimited. It’s going to go forever’, it actually might not. War, war can break out again within a few hours. Being a superpower with bunker busters might not be enough.

None of this is new. Let’s look at an older superpower, the Roman Empire. Fielding the best trained and equipped professional armies in the world, backed up by huge reserves, massive naval support, ground-breaking logistics, transport and communications links, and impregnable fortifications — it was no surprise the legions were rarely bested. And when, inevitably, defeat was dealt to whichever upstart nation thought to defy Rome, the subsequent peace brokered would never be breached. Right?

Wrong. Occasionally the underdog not only left the legions with a sore head, but even broke a peace accord to come back for another round. One such occasion was the Scottish campaign of Emperor Septimius Severus, AD 208-211. As archaeologist Simon Elliott describes it, the campaign was the epitome of “shock and awe”. Initially it seemed to work. Septimius Severus brought 50,000 troops to York, as well as his two sons, Caracalla and Geta, the Empress Julia Domna, his treasury and his whole court.. The troublesome Scottish tribes, the “barbarians who were in revolt and overrunning the country” as reported by the then governor of Britannia, then heard of this army and its armada, and had second thoughts. It is recorded the Caledonians sent peace envoys to York. But the early negotiations failed; the emperor headed north to subjugate the barbarians beyond Hadrian’s Wall.

All around me in the video are the lumps and bumps evidencing the vast legionary fortress at Carpow on Tayside, where Severus housed his thousands of soldiers and sailors. It is thought to have been built thirty years earlier, during the reign of Emperor Commodus, but Severus expanded and renewed the fort, adding a fortified harbour for his huge navy. From here, with his elder son Caracalla, he launched a two-pronged attack deep into the Highlands. The tribesmen were caught between the navy along the east coast, Caracalla with the larger part of the army sealing off the mountains with a string of forts along the Gask Ridge, and Septimius Severus himself leading the rest of his forces into Fife. The Romans experienced foul weather and a difficult terrain, fighting an elusive enemy. The Scots used guerrilla tactics, slipping away into the misty glens and steep crags. Nevertheless, the Romans prevailed. Severus was an experienced campaigner, and the might of the Romans forced the Scots tribes to sue for peace. An accord was reached, and victory proclaimed by the emperor. A peace that would ‘go forever’, he must have hoped. Severus returned to York for the winter, with the campaign apparently over.

But the peace was illusory. By summer AD 210 the native Scots had changed their minds, and raised revolt, breaking the truce. Severus — already an old man — was failing in health. Enraged, and perhaps knowing he was on his deathbed, the emperor ordered his son to carry out a genocidal retaliation against the barbarians, which Caracalla did, with impunity. Had Severus lived, it might well have led, as Simon Elliott argues in his 2018 history Septimius Severus in Scotland, to the permanent incorporation of at least part of Scotland into the Roman empire.

But now something happened that perhaps can be compared to the NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2020. Severus died in February AD 211, in York. His squabbling sons, focussed on securing power in the empire’s capital, withdrew their troops. They raced back to Rome, where things went horribly wrong between the brothers. But that’s a story for another day.

All that was left north of Hadrian’s Wall were crumbling forts, and a deep brooding quiet over the ravaged landscape. Archaeological evidence suggests it took generations for lowland and central Scotland to recover, with land left uncultivated and settlements abandoned.

It was a power vacuum. And we all know what happens to vacuums. As in Afghanistan with the Taliban, so perhaps in lowland Scotland with the Picts. Though it took quite a while — till the end of the third century — for the Romans to realise their mistake in allowing a strong new enemy from the far north to fill the vacuum they had left.

The proof of the peace pudding is so often in the eating. Roman history, as ever, has much to teach us. Beware of proclaiming a premature peace — the conflict might not yet be over.

Book Reviews

During our trip to Italy in May, I found travelling by train to be ideal for catching up on reading. Here are brief reviews of a few books I read and enjoyed.

The Names by Florence Knapp

I love what-if stories, where characters are faced with pathways, leaving the reader to conjecture with alternatives. Never more so than in this beautifully-written debut novel. Cora, wife to a local doctor, gives birth to her second child, a baby boy, in circumstances causing her to make the choice of his name. From this point their lives splinter into three rapidly diverging possibilities.

In some ways reminiscent of Kate Atkinson’s Ursula in Life After Life, this is a superb first novel. The original premise creates a wonderful structure, building and breaking possible lives for Cora and her children, over and over. Highly recommended.

Silverview by John le Carré

I looked forward to this final novel from the consummate thriller writer of my generation, from the moment it was announced. Then I wondered whether knowing it was the last complete le Carré book might somehow spoil my pleasure. Or if the master’s talents had faded near the end.

I needn’t have worried. This is a miracle of a story, and possibly the wisest, most touching and satisfying of all his works. I won’t say more, except to acknowledge that in bookseller Julian Lawdsley, le Carré has created a sublime main character of intelligence, tact and moral fibre. What a wonderful parting gift to his millions of fans!

Pompeii by Robert Harris

It’s difficult to believe this book was published fifteen years ago, or that I’ve now read it at least half a dozen times. I’m an unashamed Harris fan, and read everything he publishes instantly. Having come back from exploring Herculaneum a few weeks ago with a story of my own buzzing, I’m still in awe of this book. It combines Harris’s trademark research with a story so gripping it whacks you over the head — despite us all knowing how it’s going to end. Now that’s what I call writing.

Next question is: can I do the same? Can I conjure a character as engaging as his aquarius (water engineer) Attilius? We’ll have to wait and see. I’m 5k words into A Night Blacker and Darker, with Vesuvius beginning to shower ash and pumice…

My News

• I had the best fun on Tuesday this week, in the beautiful Master’s House in Ledbury, Herefordshire. This spectacular Tudor mansion is now the home of Ledbury library. Together with fellow crime writers Linda Mather and Sarah Hilary, I was invited, as part of National Crime Reading Month 2025, to chat about crime writing, our writing processes, and how we envisage our characters. Our super audience asked loads of clever questions — I hope we didn’t disappoint!

• Next week we’re heading north for more research for book 2 in my new Otto Cornelius mystery series, set in Wroxeter Roman city (Viroconium Cornoviorum). I’m taking my well-thumbed copy of the essential guide to Viroconium with me to meet the lead author, archaeologist Roger White. Roger has been involved in digs at Wroxeter since 1976 and still is, so I’m very lucky and grateful that he’s found time to meet me.

  Of course we’ll be going back to Wroxeter itself, to walk this remarkable city and chat to English Heritage site manager, Kirsty Matthews.

• I’m away at Theakston’s Old Peculier crime writing festival in July. It’s my first visit, so I’ll be low profile, sitting at the feet of the giants of the genre: Lee Child, Paula Hawkins, Kate Mosse, Val McDermid. Speaking of which, this year’s programming chair is Mick Herron, so I’ll get plenty of hero worship in.

• If you’re planning to be in and around Ross on Wye on Sunday 17 August, do come and chat to me at the Ross Book Fair (Larruperz Community Centre, 12-4).

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All Jacquie’s books, short stories, magazine articles, and her Youtube channel with dozens of research videos can be found on Linktree. Just keep scrolling!

June is National Crime Writing Month, when crime writers and readers across the UK gather to share their delight in the genre, while raising awareness of literacy in partnership with the Reading Agency. This year I’m joining fellow authors Linda Mather and Sarah Hilary in a panel event at Ledbury library, 6.30 to 8.00 pm on Tuesday 24th June.

We’re being joined by librarian Nina, who I’m sure will be kind with her interrogations! Whilst we’re all crime writers, we write in very different sub-genres — contemporary cosy crime, psychological thrillers, and historical crime — so there will be something for everyone in this line-up. A range of our books will be available for dedication and signing too, and refreshments are included.

This is a ticketed event; you can book here. I hope you can join us for this fun evening, in the beautiful Master’s House in Ledbury.

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[Forum at Pompeii, with Vesuvius in background]

In AD 79, Vesuvius, the volcano that looms over the bay of Naples erupted, destroying the bustling commercial city of Pompeii, and the smaller luxury resort of Herculaneum. Pompeii was covered by 7 metres of ash and debris; Herculaneum was buried by up to 25 metres of subsequent mudflows. Hundreds of people were killed and the buried towns were largely forgotten.

At the time of the disaster, the admiral of the Roman fleet at nearby Misenum was the renowned naturalist and writer Pliny the Elder. He observed the initial eruption at midday on 24 August (other months have been postulated, but this date is best-known). Fascinated by the towering pine-tree shaped cloud blasted up by the mountain, he ordered a ship to be made ready so he could examine the incident from the sea. As he was leaving his house, a messenger arrived to report that his close friend, Rectina, whose husband Tascius had assembled one of the greatest libraries of the time in their home at the very foot of Vesuvius, was in great danger — along with the precious books. Pliny realised that many other residents of the bay would also need rescue, and set sail with his whole fleet, leaving his sister and her young son behind.

Whilst his ship was rowed to the disaster zone through falling ash, and over waters clogged by floating pumice, he continued to dictate observations of the natural phenomenon. When his helmsman begged him to turn back, Pliny refused, telling the man that Fortune stood by the courageous. The ship reached Stabiae, where Pliny disembarked, bathed, and calmly ate dinner with friends. He even went to bed, and was snoring loudly when his friends woke him, to abandon their shaking house. But the sea was now too rough to take to the ships, and Pliny, struggling to breathe in the sulphurous fume, lay down on the shore to die.

We know all this because that young nephew left behind at Misenum was, of course, Pliny the Younger. The letters he wrote to Tacitus the historian (he of The Agricola fame, the account of the Roman conquest of Britain) are an eyewitness account of the eruption and tell the story of his brave old uncle. Those letters have been preserved to the modern era, and over the past 250 years extensive excavation has brought the buried cities back to life, like flies caught in amber.

It has been the ambition of a lifetime for me to visit these famous sites, as it must be for anyone interested in Roman history. Although much of Pompeii remains hidden still, it’s a unique opportunity to walk the excavated streets, to pass dozens of little shops, explore workshops, laundries, fast food outlets, and roam houses and gardens. But it’s not just the murals, graffiti, and artefacts left behind for archaeology to uncover that so impressed me. Of all the ancient sites I’ve walked, these places are the most magical, because here above all, the townspeople still linger. As I noted in my travel blog (peteandjacmotorbikingandtravels), despite the slavery, the togas, the lack of cars, electricity and internet, to walk in these towns is to rub elbows with long-dead Romans.

As a writer of Roman fiction, I was bound to feel moved and inspired. And so I was, above all by the last place we saw: the boathouses in Herculaneum, on what was then the seashore.

As you can see, the sea no longer fringes this area. In fact, where I stood to take this picture is the unexcavated spoil dumped by the volcano, much higher than the original shoreline. In these warehouses were found the bodies of more than 300 people, clearly assembled to await rescue by sea. As we know, that rescue never came. Instead, four waves of super-heated air rushed down the mountain’s sides, and the frightened people gathered in the boathouses died. That represents 300 tragedies, each with their individual story to be told.

But the story I want to tell is of someone who was found outside, on the beach. He was lying face down, accompanied by his dagger, his sword and a pouch containing the sort of sum paid monthly to a senior officer. He was at least forty, muscular and fit. Judging by his uniform, he may have been of the elite Praetorian Guard, and just possibly, had been sent by Admiral Pliny to co-ordinate the rescue of the unfortunates on the beach at Herculaneum.

We’ll probably never know who this man was, or what his mission had been. And that suits me fine; I have enough details to fire the imagination, but not too many to limit my storytelling. Somehow, it seems fitting that what I eventually bring back from my visit is my own tribute to one very brave man, who died doing his duty.

Anthology: The Ring

The anthology of historical short stories written by a group of author friends and me was published on 1 May. I’m very happy to say it shot to #1 in its Amazon category straightaway. Since then it’s sold steadily in ebook and paperback, each sale making money for our chosen charity, The Reading Agency. We’re thrilled, of course, and if I say so myself, they’re all excellent stories. The anthology is based on the theme of Fortuna’s ring, passed down the generations, and not always bringing good luck. The book is currently on book blog tour; here’s a fantastic recent review from Mason’s Menagerie. If you like short stories, or crime/historical fiction, or just enjoy a damn good read, please buy and share with your friends and family. Every penny raised will be spent on improving adult and child literacy through UK libraries, a cause very dear to all our hearts.

My News

• The Silver Mirror, the opening book in my new Otto Cornelius series, is now finished and with my publisher. That was quite the labour of love, taking only five months from first idea to completion. I’m already working on the next in series — working title The Salt Road — which, as the title suggests, will feature Droitwich Spa as well as Wroxeter. I’ve arranged to meet a distinguished archaeologist familiar with Roman Shropshire and environs next month, but I can already tell you a Roman-period skeleton found in a brine pit in Droitwich has inspired the starting point. More next month on my research for this new mystery.

• National Crime Reading Month is almost upon us. If you’re UK-based, look out for crime reading events in libraries and bookshops throughout June. I’ve got a couple of author events being arranged. At 6.30 on Tuesday 24 June, I’ll be In Conversation with fellow crime writers Linda Mather and Sarah Hilary at Ledbury library. This a ticketed event including a glass of wine, so you’ll need to check with the library (01432 383499) if you’re in the area. Before that, I’m part of an author panel being organised by The Hive at Worcester. Details have yet to be finalised, but it’s likely to be sometime w/c 16 June. I’ll send out a flash with more on that shortly.

That’s all for this newsletter. Next month I’ll be reviewing my recent reading, and no doubt will have tales to tell from NCRM. Check my Youtube channel for my latest research videos; if you’re interested to find out more about my trip to Roman sites in Marseille and Nice, as well as Pompeii, Herculaneum, and old Naples, go to my travel blog. (Click on Pilgrimage to Pompeii for the drop-down menu.)

Bye for now!

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All Jacquie’s books, short stories, non-fiction articles and her Youtube channel with dozens of research videos can be found on Linktree. Just keep scrolling!

I’m lucky enough to have some lovely friends among the writing community. One of them is Alistair Forrest (more about Alistair’s work below). I’ve been mulling over something he wrote a couple of weeks ago, in his own Substack (recommended: Not in the Script): “Are we born just to pay the bills and die? Or can we writers make a difference with stories that help fashion a future to be proud of?” As a writer of historical fiction myself, with occasional forays into SFF, I’ve never really thought of my writing having any influence on the future. I may have reasoned that my efforts to better the world ended when I left teaching. However, one of my readers (a lovely lady named Helen) left this comment about my book The Loyal Centurion on Goodreads: “Once again…reminding us that the qualities of good — and evil — have existed throughout the centuries.”

Thank you, Helen, for summarising why I write historical fiction. It’s to bring the people of ancient times into our own world; to indicate how like us they were; and show that their battles, despairs and triumphs are the same as ours. It’s to demonstrate that good and bad have always existed in human society; and that the effort to live a good life continues to be worth the struggle.

I hope that doesn’t sound either trite or grandiose. I think it’s worth going back to basics to explore why we write, and why we read what others have written. There — sermon over!

That leads me neatly into a bit of a trumpet blast. The Ring, the historical fiction anthology I’ve been a part of, is now on Amazon for pre-order. It publishes on 1st May, £2.99 for Kindle ($3.61 for US friends). The paperback edition will follow shortly. As you can see, the cover (designed by the fabulous Ian Bristow) is so spectacular, you’ll want to buy copies for all the short story lovers you know.

The authors involved have united varying historical backgrounds by using the theme of a ring — Fortuna’s gold ring — passed down through the generations and over oceans. But fortune can be fickle, as our stories show in different ways. The anthology includes ten stories by writers at the top of their game: Alistair Forrest (Roman BC); Fiona Forsyth (who edited the book, as well as contributing an Ovid story — Augustan period); Alistair Tosh (post-Roman); Graham Brack (17th century), Eleanor Swift-Hook (17th century); Mark Turnbull (English Civil War); Maggie Richell-Davies (18th century); Robert Bordas (turn of 20th century); Val Penny (contemporary crime). The book takes us right up to the 21st century, and brings the ring home. I’m in the mix too, giving my own dark slant on the well-known Roman Britain Barates-and-Regina story.

So a guaranteed terrific read. But that’s not the best of it. From the start of this project, we intended to donate all proceeds to a UK-wide charity supporting reading and libraries. We quickly settled on the perfect choice: The Reading Agency. This is what they say about their work: “The Reading Agency is a UK charity that inspires social and personal change through the proven power of reading. We work with individuals of all ages, communities and trusted partners to share the transformative benefits of reading for happy, healthy and thriving lives. In the UK:

• 1 in 6 (8.5 million) adults struggle to read

• 1 in 4 children in England cannot read well by the age of 11

This limits life chances and choices.”

Much of their work is in partnership with public libraries. And if there are two things authors are passionate about, it’s fostering reading, and supporting libraries.

So please take look at The Ring. Support The Reading Agency by buying it, if you can, and share the link with other readers who might enjoy it. We’re hoping to raise lots of money for the charity. All proceeds go straight to The Reading Agency.

Book reviews

Death and the Poet by Fiona Forsyth

What a joy it is to contemplate the pleasure of a new Ovid mystery! Author Fiona Forsyth doesn’t disappoint, in this second outing for Rome’s most famous poet-turned-sleuth.

This time Ovid, joined by his lush retired centurion pal, Avitius, finds himself hunting down the truth behind the death of a vegetable stallholder. The plot thickens when a suspect who vehemently denies culpability suddenly changes his mind.

In the series opener, set during Ovid’s recorded time of exile in Tomis on the Black Sea, we met his charming circle of friends, mainly innkeepers. Quel surprise! This time machinations in Rome, involving the elderly Augustus and his wife Livia, entail the addition into the story of Ovid’s long-suffering wife, Fabia. What a sagacious daughter of Rome she turns out to be.

The denouement is satisfyingly twisty, with the very final word of the book setting up the next book enticingly. The only problem now will be waiting while the author writes it!

For an immersive, engaging and erudite trip to a fascinating Roman province, you can’t do better than this book. Enjoy!

And just to prove I don’t only read books my talented friends, honourable mentions this month go to:

The Well of Saint Nobody, by Neil Jordan

Somewhat diminished by the seemingly abrupt switch change of genre halfway through, from faintly fantastical Irish lyricism to full-on gritty urban noir, this outing by the film-maker is nevertheless thought-provoking and twisty enough to be a good read.

The Secret Hours by Mick Herron

Lovers of the Slow Horses series won’t need me to recommend this associated thriller. Stunning — of course. Entertaining — definitely! I was privileged to see Mick Herron speak at a wonderfully relaxed and cosy event near Oxford recently. Very few blockbuster authors can be as approachable and down-to-earth as Mick. He’s deserving of every accolade that comes his way. He’s also a leading organiser of the Theakston’s Old Peculiar Crime Writing Festival, at Harrogate in July. I’m going this year, and it will be such a privilege to meet him again there.

My News

As well as lovely afternoons spent chatting and signing books with University of the Third Age, Evesham, and The Network in the exquisite black-and-white village of Weobley, Herefordshire, I’m still buzzing from last weekend at Avoncroft Museum’s International Living History Festival. Such fun to see English Civil War soldiers saluting WW2 GIs!, and multiple Glorianas sweeping by in tandem!

• And finally … I’m pleased to let you know that the finished draft of my fifth Roman Britain mystery, The Silver Mirror, has now gone off to my super publishers, Sapere Books. It also in the hands of beta readers, who I hope will enjoy their sneak preview of the first in the new Otto Cornelius series. I don’t yet have a publication date for this first outing for Otto and his friends from Viroconium Cornoviorum (Wroxeter Roman city). As soon as I have an inkling, you’ll be the first to know.

  The new series will eventually alternate with the continuing Quintus Valerius books, of which the fourth, The Bath Curse, is written and raring to go. There will be more announcements this summer and autumn, so now might be a good time to catch up on the existing Quintus books.

  I’m away now for a few weeks with my exhausted First Reader, AKA husband Peter. Not that much of a rest, as I’m dragging him round Pompeii and Herculaneum. More on that in my next newsletter!

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Apologies to my lovely friends outside the UK. This is a flash notice for anyone who can get to Bromsgrove in Worcestershire, next weekend. I’m taking part in Meet the Author at the International Living History Festival at Avoncroft historic buildings museum, 26th and 27th April, 10am to 4pm.

I’m be there at Meet the Author, in my trusty Roman costume to give talks, chat, and sign my books all weekend,

My illustrated talks, at 2.00 on Saturday and 11.30 on Sunday will focus on how I research my Quintus Valerius books, and of course the new Otto Cornelius series.

It’s such a beautiful site, and the whole event will be very exciting. Do bring your family to explore the 19-acre site full of historic buildings, brought to life with re-enactors from the Bronze Age to the Cold War. There will be lots of hands-on activities: you can explore the historically themed market and delve right into the past.

I’m looking forward to seeing you — if you miss the talks, please don’t be shy. Just come for a chat at my book signing table, in the museum’s main hall.

And book your tickets now!

[image: Creative Commons World History Encyclopaedia]

Last month I wrote about the Emperor Carausius, who was a Roman role model of treachery and usurpation. This month, I’d like to introduce you to his even worse predecessor.

Meet Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus, better known as Emperor Commodus. He is a wonderful example of why heritage is not always a safe bet when choosing your successor.

Commodus was born in AD 161, one of twins to the esteemed philosopher-emperor Marcus Aurelius. His best-known depiction in our era is as the crazed ruler/gladiator who challenged the fictional Maximus Decimus Meridius to battle in the arena we call the Colosseum.

Passing swiftly on from Hollywood blockbusters and their slight-to-tangential relationship with actual history, we can find much in Commodus’s real life of interest. And as mentioned in my February newsletter, if you happen to note any parallels with modern events, that’s up to you.

On his accession at age 18 to sole imperial rule in AD 180, Commodus wasted no time in drawing a line under his father’s reign. He began by devaluing the Roman currency, reducing the amount of silver in the coinage (denarii). This had inevitable effects on the economy, such as inflation.

Commodus’s ruling style was to encourage strife in politics. He was capricious and arbitrary. He neglected administrative duties in favour of sport — no, not golf — gladiatorial combat. His lifestyle was unacceptably luxurious. He surrounded himself with sycophants and favourites, leaving them to run the empire. His officials and advisers became immensely wealthy and powerful. It was a regime run on corruption and exploitation.

His vanity and need for public worship led him to commission numerous ridiculous statues of himself. Nevertheless, he remained popular with the working people of Rome for most of his reign. Eventually the instability of Commodus’s rule led to his assassination.

Fortunately, nothing like any of this could happen today, given all the checks and balances of modern democracies.

My own interest in this least of Roman rulers came about when I visited the site of the huge fort of Carpow, at Abernethy on Tayside, in Scotland. I was researching my third Roman mystery/thriller, The Loyal Centurion, with scenes at the Roman fort and the nearby Pictish hill fort of Castlelaw. The book is set in the later Severan period, so I was surprised to discover in the excellent Abernethy Roman museum that Carpow was initially built during the reign of Commodus, by Governor Ulpius Marcellus. It was abandoned at the death of Commodus, but had been well-built. The fortress formed a major centre for the Severan Caledonian campaigns, thirty years later.

Commodus lasted twelve years as solo emperor. Lacking election cycles, his enemies had to resort to assassination. A bad Roman habit, I think we’d all agree. Civil war followed, and when Septimius Severus eventually won out, he had much work to do to restore the empire. The golden age of Rome was over, and although there was recovery, and decent strong emperors down the line, Rome was never quite the same again.

My March News

• April events

My robe and palla are to be joined by a pair of more authentic Roman lady’s shoes. And just in the nick of time, as I now have my first outdoor(ish) event of the season coming up, as well as my talks to Evesham University of the 3rd Age on 2nd April, and the Hereford Network at Weobley Village Hall on 16th April.

Fellow crime author, Linda Mather kindly suggested my name, as a lady with a costume who is keen to talk about Romans, to the International Living History Festival at Avoncroft, near Bromsgrove. 40 different re-enactment groups will make Avoncroft Outdoor Museum their home over the weekend of April 26th-27th, with history from the Bronze Age to the Cold War represented. And me, too.

I’m tremendously excited, and praying for good weather! (Details of my talk times to follow.)

The Governor’s Man, The Carnelian Phoenix, and my most recently published book, The Loyal Centurion are all available in ebook and paperback on Amazon.

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This is Marcus Aurelius Mausaeus Carausius, self-styled Emperor of the North, who ruled Britain and parts of Belgium and northern France from AD 286 till his death in AD 293. You may not have heard of him, but bear with me. His period of power has much to tell us, about usurpation, treachery and even propaganda. If you note any parallels with current events in our world, I’m there with you.

Take a deep breath…

Carausius was born sometime in the mid-third century, into the Menapii tribe of what is now Belgium.

Growing up by the coast, he may have found it natural to join the Roman navy, a steady job in a time of turmoil. He quickly rose in the ranks, and after success in battle was put in charge of the classis britannica, the fleet protecting Rome’s North Sea and Channel waters. At this point, he began to use state institutions to feather his own nest.

It is recorded that Carausius used his position to turn a blind eye to private raids, and then capture the stolen treasure for himself. Having been convicted as a felon, he escaped justice by simply grabbing power in AD 286. In his day, this would mean taking control of the military, rather than rail-roading an elective body: in this instance, the three British legions. Such an exercise in sweeping executive power flew in the face of all Roman constitutional and legal precedent. And by calling himself “Emperor”, he was able to hold his powerful military force via their prior sworn oaths to the Imperial throne.

As self-proclaimed Emperor of the North, Carausius now consolidated his political power by the clever use of propaganda. He had coins struck in his image, declaring himself “Restorer of Britain”, and “Peace-bringer to the World”. Coinage being the red caps and social media of the period, he portrayed himself the co-equal of the bona fide existing Roman co-emperors of east and west, Diocletian and Maximian.

Pevensey Castle, in Sussex, may have been established by Carausius as part of his defences.

Carausius, like modern-day autocrats, had a catch-phrase that was designed to appeal to the labouring classes of his time: he told them “the Golden Ages are back”. And for a while, it seemed so. To help him secure his position, he seized provincial assets and appointed a treasurer to re-allocate imperial funds to maintain his own position.

The chosen (unelected) financial whizz was one Allectus. He began by standing shoulder to shoulder with Carausius. But — and you’ll have guessed this bit — the two soon fell out. In AD 293, Carausius came to a sticky end when he was assassinated by his buddy Allectus. Allectus took power, only to suffer the same fate a few years later.

Britain and Gaul were quickly gathered back into the Roman fold and, for better or worse, survived as imperial provinces for another century or more. Britannia had a final moment of Roman imperial glory when Constantine the Great was proclaimed emperor, by the British legions at York in AD 306.

Is there a moral in Carausius’s story? Maybe — you can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time. But when the fooled and betrayed come to their senses, you’d better watch out.

My February News

• Update on The Silver Mirror

I’ve got to the sticky mid-point crisis in my new Roman Britain mystery. We’ll be rolling downhill from this point (once I’ve worked out how the complexities of the plot unwind themselves!) I have a deadline at the end of April to deliver the MS to my lovely new publishers, Sapere Books. They’ve also contracted me to write another two books in the Otto Cornelius series, all set in and around wonderful Viroconium Cornoviorum (Wroxeter Roman city, as seen below).

• Meanwhile, Quintus and friends are being dusted down, to re-appear in my fourth Quintus Valerius mystery, expected in 2026. So plenty more Roman Britain mystery and action to look forward to!

• Ross on Wye Book Fair

  If you’re anywhere near Ross-on-Wye, Herefordshire, on Sunday 17th August, do drop in to see me. I’m sharing a table with crime/fantasy writer, PR Ellis. We’ll be chatting to readers, signing books, and talking all things bookish and about writing, from 12 to 4pm at Larruperz Community Centre, HR9 7QD.

The third in Jacquie’s Quintus Valerius Roman Britain mystery series, The Loyal Centurion, is out in ebook and paperback. The first in her new Otto Cornelius series, set in Roman Wroxeter, is forthcoming from Sapere Books. You can find all her books and short story anthologies, follow her on social media, watch her research videos, and read her magazine articles at Linktree.

[image credits; photos 1-4 Wikimedia Commons; 5-7 author’s own.]

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