"The Catiline Conspiracy"

The Catiline Conspiracy [SPQR II] (John Roberts)

I liked the previous book in this series well enough, but this one kind of fell flat; I think the problem is that this book has even less of a climax than the previous one. (I don't want to spoil it, but you might want to skip past this sentence if you're worried: The ending is basically "I informed the guys in charge and they took care of it" which is very realistic but not very exciting.)
To be fair, this book is very realistic and accurate, and while I enjoyed all the meticulous attention to detail in the setting and knowing what was going to happen from reading Roman history, for some reason this time to lack of a climax really bugged me. Maybe it's the fact that our main character never really felt that important to what was happening, or the way that his love interest has nothing to do with the rest of the plot, but whatever the reason, this is tough to recommend unless the rich, detailed setting is enough to make you happy. As for me, I'm going to try one more book in this series and see if it feels a little narratively tighter.

Grade: B-