DP54Cover - Deadly Pleasures

during the Inquisition, and all the way up to the 20 th century
(earlier parts of which are now considered “historical”).
One of the finest history mystery series features
Gordianus the Finder, Steven Saylor’s wonderful creation.
Gordianus is a “finder,” analogous to a P.I. of today. He
lives in the time of Ancient Rome and his lifetime stretches
through some of the most dramatic events of that era.
The latest entry into the series, THE TRIUMPH
OF CAESAR, takes us to Rome at the time of Julius
Caesar, who has returned after multiple victories. He has
just been declared Dictator by the Roman Senate. Some
say he wants even more power and rumors abound of plots
against his life. Calpurnia, Caesar’s wife, secretly hires
Gordianus to uncover these plots. He is a replacement for
her first investigator who was murdered. It turns out the
dead man is Hieronymous, Gordianus’s close friend, so
Gordianus has two reasons to find out what is going on and
to bring his friend’s killer to justice.
THE TRIUMPH OF CAESAR
is an entertaining and illuminating mystery,
written, it seems, to memorialize
the four successive Triumphs of Julius
Caesar. These passages concerning the
parades are written in great and careful
detail. Recognizable historical figures
abound: Mark Antony, Julius Caesar,
Calpurnia, Brutus, and Cicero, among
many others. Saylor describes each one
in very human terms. The novel is exciting
and well paced. The mystery is clever,
although slightly over-the-top. This longstanding
series is still going strong and
THE TRIUMPH OF CAESAR is a
welcome addition to it.
THE AMATEUR SPY by Dan
Fesperman (Knopf, $24.95). Rating:
A- Dan Fesperman has written some
of the most timely suspense novels of our day. His books
reflect the latest news headlines. Each book is well
researched and full of detail, as one would expect from this
veteran investigative journalist. It is impossible for the
reader to go away uninformed about the peoples and
places that are found in his books. Some settings of his
previous novels have been war-ravaged Yugoslavia, Afghanistan,
Guantanamo and now with the current book,
the West Bank in Jordan.
Freeman Lockhart has moved to a Greek Island
with his wife Mila. Both of them have recently retired from
the grueling job of humanitarian work. Before they can get
settled into their new life, they are visited by three men who
forcefully persuade Freeman into working for an old friend
of his who runs a Palestinian relief organization, which is
suspected of being a terrorist front. Freeman is hired to
handle the organization’s accounting. He travels to Jordan
and directly into a very dangerous situation.
Meanwhile in Washington, D.C., Abbas Rahim, a
Palestinian American physician, gets involved in a poten-
Reviews
Deadly Pleasures
53
tially catastrophic terrorist plot to kill many important
political figures. His wife, Aliyah, discovers what her
husband is up to and wants to foil the plot. She goes to
Jordan to receive the aid money that will finance it and her
path eventually crosses with Freeman’s. Can disaster be
averted?
The careful details of a Dan Fesperman novel are
both a strength and a weakness of THE AMATEUR SPY.
As a strength, they give the book life and a certain topical
importance about a current hot spot: in this case, the
Bakaa refugee camp outside of Amman. The weakness of
the details is that they can slow the book down to a crawling
pace. In this instance, the strength of the details far
outweigh the weakness. Characters are realistic and
believable, especially the likeable and sympathetic Freeman.
THE AMATEUR SPY is highly recommended,
as are all of Dan Fesperman’s earlier books.
RULES OF DECEPTION by Christopher
Reich (Doubleday, $24.95). Rating:
B+ Dr. Jonathan Ransom, a surgeon for
Doctors Without Borders, is devastated when
his wife, Emma, is killed while mountaineering
in Switzerland. As he attempts to get her
affairs in order, he is soon made aware that
his wife was not at all she appeared to be. He
discovers that she had an entire separate
identity.
As Jonathan looks into his wife’s past, he
finds himself the target of a professional
hitman. At the same time, law enforcement
agents become aware of a possible terrorist
plot that could start a nuclear war in the
Middle East. Jonathan is suddenly considered
a chief suspect in this plot.
Jonathan must keep one step ahead of
the authorities while continuing to search for
answers in his wife’s past. He soon realizes he is at the
center of the possible start of a major war. Can he save the
day?
Chris Reich has written a fun, fast-paced thriller
that is both timely and quite frightening. Characters are
realistic but lack a great deal of depth. An annoying
tendency in this book is the overuse of detailed descriptions
of the past lives of each character – even if they live for only
another few minutes.
Yet, as the book reaches the end, the pages do fly.
The end is unrealistic and there is a plot twist concerning
someone from Jonathan’s past reappearing, which I
considered lazy writing. But overall, this is a solid thriller
that will be well received by the crowds around the pools
or on the planes.
GOOD PEOPLE by Marcus Sakey (Dutton,
$24.95). Rating: A- Tom and Anna Reed are a young
couple who are struggling to make ends meet and who
desperately want a child. They have spent more than they
could afford at infertility clinics with no results. When their