Customer Reviews

The Lydian Baker

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A friend gave me a copy of this book. I had not read any Wishart before. I have to confess that I most likely would not have read any Wishart on my own steam. I have very very fussy taste in historical fiction of any kind, and often roundly dislike historical fiction detective novels.

Wishart is a classics scholar who turned his hand to writing Roman detective novels while living abroad teaching English as a Second Language. His novels feature the character Marcus Corvinus. In The Lydian Baker Corvinus is living in Athens when his father-in-law writes him and asks him to acquire a particular statue for an astronomical sum. It turns out that the statue is made of solid gold and that more than one party is interested. Unfortunately, at least one of the other parties is willing to stoop to violence to make sure that they have the highest bid...

One of the things that Wishart fans seem to like is that Marcus Corvinus talks like Philip Marlowe. It is meant to be amusing, but it drove me mad and almost caused me to give up on the book after 50 pages. I am not sure what ancient Romans would have talked like, but it felt like an anachronism to hear hard-boiled slang coming out of his mouth. After about 20 pages, I was absolutely certain that I was going to loathe the book.

I am not really sure what happened after that. Perhaps it was the little details of life that Wishart included. Perhaps it was the plot. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that I read it just a day or two after returning from Rome. Whatever the reason, I kind of forgot that I hated it and started being interested. By the end of the book, I was reasonably hooked. Although I still cringed once or twice at the language, I would have to admit that overall I enjoyed the ride. I even enjoyed it enough that I am planning to circle back around and read Ovid, the first book in the series. The friend who gave me the book warned me that it was one of the weaker books in the group, so I am curious to see how well I enjoy a book considered to be one of the better series entries.

I'm a mystery buff, not necessarily historical mysteries, although those folks who really know the period make them worth the read - particularly the authors who specialize in ancient Rome. I also appreciate a little humor and an effort to break the unrelenting misery that (in real life) was the lot of most people. I like Lindsey Davis, John Maddox Roberts, Steven Saylor (when he isn't being too serious,) and have become fond of David Wishart. His books haven't been available in the U.S. until recently, so I've purchased most of the ones I've read from England.

Unlike a previous reviewer, I like having the people talk in modern syntax in books set in historical times. Frankly, we have no clue how people spoke to each other outside of literature - and until the 20th century, literary language and spoken language were not the same thing. On a daily basis, people spoke to each other pretty much the way we do - given language differences and phrasing, and so forth. Writing the spoken word as if it were translated straight from ancient Latin would be tedious at best!

The hardest part about Wishart books is keeping track of the characters - the names are so different from ours and there are so many characters that I find myself referring to the list of characters frequently. I like his use of characters and descriptions of people in terms that show that folks were folks and politicians were politicians and greedy grubbers were greedy grubbers, no matter how many centuries separate us. This is Wishart's strength and I appreciate it.

The one thing I've noticed is that I normally don't need to reread Wishart's books. For a good mystery, this is unusual for me - I own all of Lindsey Davis and John Maddox Roberts for example. However, I would definitley recommend reading his books - they are enjoyable.

I've bought a number of them from England, and paid the (gasp) high exchange and postage - so did think it was worthwhile.

David Wishart was born in Arbroath, Scotland. He studied Classics - Latin and Greek - at Edinburgh University and after graduation taught for four years in a secondary school. He then retrained as a teacher of English as a Foreign Language and worked abroad for eleven years, in Kuwait, Greece and Saudi Arabia. He returned to Scotland in 1990 and now lives with his family in Carnoustie, mixing writing with teaching EFL and study skills at Dundee University.

This is the first in the series of novel by the author featuring Marcus Corvinus, an amateur sleuth and connoisseur of fine wines. The books take a similar theme to the Falco novels of Lindsey Davis, but Falco and Corvinus are from different periods of Roman history. The time period and class of Wishart's sleuth are different. Falco lives in Flavian Rome and has just worked his way into the Equestrian class, while Corvinus is a patrician in the age of Tiberius. However both Corvinus and Falco have a wife behind them, each of who it could be said, is the making of them. Like Davis's Falco, Corvinus is now becoming like an old friend.

Marcus Corvinus receives a letter from his stepfather Priscus. Through his contacts he has learned that the gold statue of a female baker, a fabulous gift to the Delphic Oracle in the 6th century BC, has suddenly reappeared from nowhere and is currently been offered on the black market. Marcus somewhat against his better judgement agrees to try to buy it, but finds himself caught up in a deadly struggle.