While I'm still enjoying this series, I think this is one of the weaker offerings. Doctor Gaius Ruso has left the Roman army in Britain and has followed the tribune Accius to Rome. Once there, however, he and his British wife Tilla struggle to find suitable employment and housing. This changes when Ruso is asked to fill in for another doctor who has purportedly taken a leave to care for an ailing father, although that story falls apart fairly quickly. Ruso prepares a medicine for his new patron, but the man dies a few days later, and Ruso is concerned that he used unverified ingredients that the other doctor left behind. There are several other subplots that put pressure on Ruso and Tilly including possible debts left by the former doctor, a body that shows up in a barrel on their doorstep, a runaway slave, a marriage plot, and more. I'm not sure what the point of the runaway slave subplot is; Ruso and Tilla buy him at auction and he runs away the same day. He comes up here and there in conversation but never resurfaces as part of the action. I kept thinking he would return and be an important part of the story's conclusion, but it never happened. While some parts of this book were very compelling, the plot is unwieldy and unconvincing. I particularly don't like when Ruso's character is depicted as weak, confused, and uncertain through the entire book until he finally gets some spine at the end. This is fine once, but it seems to happen in every single book. I'm glad the characters go back to Britain in the next book, which is set in Bath, and I hope the plot and character development improve.
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