#Ruth downie books series#

That’s just as well, because otherwise he might be prescribing jellyfish as a cure for gout, plastering on ground-up earthworms to mend severed tendons, and recommending the ash of burned seahorses (mixed with pitch or lard) as a hair-restorer.Īnyone could call themselves a doctor in the second century, so if you needed medical help it was definitely a case of ‘buyer beware’.

Luckily there’s plenty of evidence that the doctors of the classical world were a quarrelsome bunch, so Ruso doesn’t have to follow all the advice he’s given. But what if a patient arrived with toothache, and he consulted one of the respected textbooks of his day? He might prescribe the sting of a stingray-because according to Dioscorides, “it shatters the tooth and ejects it.” Which would be very authentic, but I suspect anyone reading the story would spend the next few chapters fingering their jaw, and long after closing the book they’d remember it as “that one with the thing about teeth.” He could offer a form of cataract surgery, and some of the surgical techniques he would know were still being used in the field hospitals of the First World War. There are plenty of useful things he could do: setting broken bones, stitching up wounds and putting dislocated joints back where they ought to be.

The challenge was to find the balance between making Ruso an authentic doctor of his time, and making him sound dangerously insane. It turned out that there was no shortage of medical textbooks from the ancient world. It’s probably just as well, because if I’d had the sense to run away I’d never have discovered the fantastic world that Ruso and Tilla live in. There were lots of things I didn’t know back then.

#Ruth downie books series#

If someone had told me I was going to end up writing a whole series about them, I’d never have dared to make him a medic. The Roman soldier and the British girl were only ever supposed to fill three chapters for a ‘start a novel’ competition. Guest Post: Bizarre things from research……. With Ruso’s reputation under threat, he and Tilla must protect their small family from Doctor Kleitos’ debt collectors and find allies in their new home while they track down the vanished doctor and find out the truth about the heiress’ dead father – Ruso’s patient – and the unfortunate man in the barrel. Ruso thinks that he has been offered a reputable medical practice only to find that his predecessor, Doctor Kleitos, has fled, leaving a dead man in a barrel on the doorstep and the warning “be careful who you trust.” Distracted by the body and his efforts to help a friend win the hand of a rich young heiress, Ruso makes a grave mistake, causing him to question both his competence and his integrity. There are also far too many doctors – some skilled – but others positively dangerous. Ruso and Tilla’s excitement at arriving in Rome with their new baby daughter is soon dulled by their discovery that the grand facades of polished marble mask an underworld of corrupt landlords and vermin-infested tenements. Vita Brevis (2016) (The seventh book in the Medicus Investigation series)

In the meantime she is also the New York Times bestselling author of a mystery series featuring Roman doctor Gaius Petreius Ruso. Ruth (RS) Downie graduated from university with an English degree and a plan to get married and live happily ever after. find out how you can win a few copy of this excellent book Downie's auspicious debut sparkles with beguiling characters and a vividly imagined evocation of a hazy frontier. Tilla plots her escape as she recovers from her injuries, and just when Ruso becomes attached to her, she runs away, complicating his personal life and his investigation. Gaius becomes a reluctant detective, but his sleuthing threatens to get him killed and leaves him scant time to work on the first-aid guide he's writing to help salvage his finances. Meanwhile, young women from the local bordello keep turning up dead, and nobody is interested in investigating. Gaius rescues and buys an injured slave girl, Tilla, from her abusive master, but she refuses to talk, can't cook and costs more to keep than he can afford. His quarters are filthy and vermin-filled, and his superior at the hospital is a petty tyrant. Gaius Petrius Ruso, a military medicus (or doctor), transfers to the 20th Legion in the remote Britannia port of Deva (now Chester) to start over after a ruinous divorce and his father's death. The salacious underside of Roman-occupied Britain comes to life in Britisher Downie's debut.