Venus in Copper

Rome, AD 71. Marcus Didius Falco is desperate to leave the notorious Lautumiae prison—though being bailed out by his mother is a slight indignity.

Things go from bad to worse when a group of nouveau riche ex-slaves hire him to outwit a fortune-hunting redhead, whose husbands have a habit of dying accidentally, leaving him up against a female contortionist, her extra-friendly snake, indigestible cak...