Venus in Copper

“Rats are always bigger than you expect.” Falco, ancient Rome’s hangdog investigator, hates sharing a cell with a rodent, though being bailed by his mother is almost as bad. His highborn girlfriend can’t decide if she wants him. And Titus Caesar’s reward for past services is a wet fish. Hoping for better things, he takes on new clients: on the elegant slopes of the Pincian Hill, three nouveaux riches freedmen and their flashy wives are under siege to a clever redhead, Severina Zotica, and her foul-mouthed parrot. As he pursues this flame-haired fortune-hunter, Falco finds himself beset by violent rent-racketeers, poisoners and dangerous women with designs on him.