Standalone Novels

Writing a series is great fun, but from time to time I like to step aside and do something different. All of these novels are more ambitious in scope and more serious than my crime novels. They are told in the third person, from the viewpoints of different characters, and some cover a long period of time.

The Course of Honour was in fact my first important novel, though published long after Falco. It serves as a prelude to the Falco series, as does Master and God to Albia.

I really wanted to write about the Seventeenth Century, so Rebels and Traitors is a vast book which follows a diverse cast of characters through the Civil War and Commonwealth periods. A Cruel Fate is by design a very short book, taking a concentrated look at the treatment of prisoners of war.

9780099515258-COurse of Honour UK Jacket

‘He has no money, no reputation and no famous ancestors.’

The Course of Honour

A tantalising half-sentence in Suetonius’ biography says that after his wife died, Vespasian ‘took up again with Caenis, his former mistress and one of Antonia’s freedwomen and secretaries, who remained his wife in all but name even when he became Emperor’. This is the archetypal secretary-to-boardroom plot — a true story, with a decent hero, not to mention a very strong heroine. The political events are viewed from a close vantage point – hers, so without the traditional male, aristocratic bias . A love story in which young lovers come together a second time in their middle age then are…

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An epic novel of the English Civil War

Rebels and Traitors

I was in my teens when I first started caring about the English Civil War; it has always appealed to my libertarian ideals, even though the attempt to install a republic failed and many of the great questions are still being fought over. To take one very pertinent issue, we are still debating what support should be given to soldiers who are injured in government service, and whether there should be a duty of care to the widows and children of those who are killed. The New Model Army felt passionately about that – mutinied over it even – and…

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They tried to write him out of history

Master and God

This novel’s reach stretches from the glories of monumental Rome to a prisoner-of-war camp above the snowline the wrong side of the frontier. Its settings include barracks and bars and quiet domestic rooms, the fabulous Flavian palace on the Palatine, Domitian’s fortress villa at Alba Longa, a villa that may have belonged to the poet Horace. It scoffs equally at the military life and poets. Even the doctor is paranoid. We know that Domitian killed flies with his pen – how did a fly view this? Who killed the dancer – and was it illegal? What chance Europe could have…

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A Cruel Fate

As long as war exists, this story will be relevant. Martin Watts, a bookseller, is captured by Royalists. Jane Afton’s brother Nat is taken too. They suffer inhumane treatment as prisoners-of-war. In Oxford Castle, jailor William Smith tortures, beats, starves and deprives his helpless victims. Can Jane rescue her sick brother before he dies of neglect? Will Martin dare to escape? Based on real events in the English Civil War, Lindsey Davis retells the grim tale of Captain Smith’s abuse of power in Oxford prison – where many died in misery though a lucky few survived. A Cruel Fate is…

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