Ruth Downie's Blog, page 11

In the footsteps of a Roman on a mission

A piece of unexpected good news has arrived at Downie Towers – Ruso and Tilla’s first adventure is being translated into Croatian. To celebrate, here’s a view of Croatia’s most famous Roman building, the palace of the emperor Diocletian at Split.

Diocletian was an unusual emperor. Others had commissioned sprawling extravganzas with vistas and lakes for their personal residences, but Diocletian’s architect must have been told to think very much INSIDE the box. The whole palace fitted into the s...

New website, very old gate

Thanks to lovely Stuart, chief shepherd at 3Sheep, for the revamp of the website. He’s now handed it back to me and I’ve been doing my best not to break it. If anything either doesn’t work or doesn’t make sense please be kind enough to tell me and I’ll see if I can mend it, or at least break it in a new and interesting way.

The gateway on the front page is, for those who care about these things, all that remains of the north gate of Milecastle 37 on Hadrian’s Wall. Here it is again, looking mu...

The best of 2014…

I’m delighted and honoured to find that Tabula Rasa has snuck into the Best Books of 2014 list on Declan Burke’s “Crime Always Pays” blog. It’s alongside several books that I’ve been meaning to read, and some that I didn’t know I wanted to read, but now do.

Clearly there’s going to be a lot of crime (hopefully, most of it fictional) happening on the Downie Towers sofa in 2015.

Author loses one plot, two vowels and three consonants

There’s much rejoicing here at Downie Towers over the news that the lovely Stuart (a Man who Can) will shortly be giving the blog a face-lift. l will thus be able to concentrate all of my muttering and cursing on Book Seven, which has reached that special stage where plot and author appear to be heading in opposite directions.

As Paul Theroux once observed, the writing of fiction is a messy and mysterious process. And, it seems, one that involves principally the letters I, O, L, M and N. At l...

A day of DIY

It would have been wiser not to start redesigning the blog when I’m supposed to be working on Book 7. But the layout here was looking a bit tired and it seemed like a simple enough job: just cut my name from the new book cover and paste it in at the top of the screen. How hard could that be?

I should have remembered the time Husband and I decided that plastering didn’t look all that difficult, either.

Nine hours later, I’m now going to try and put back the picture that was up there in the first...

Welcome…

…and thank you for visiting.*

I’m the author of a series of mysteries featuring Roman Army medic and reluctant sleuth, Gaius Petreius Ruso. His sixth adventure, TABULA RASA, is out now – if you glance to the right you’ll see the cover.

Here’s what’s inside:

Ruso and his wife, Tilla, are back in the borderlands of Britannia, tending the builders of Hadrian’s Great Wall. The local Britons are still smarting from the failure of a recent rebellion and now, having been forced to move off their land,...

The pleasure of being a guest

I’ve had the pleasure of being a guest twice this week – first on a virtual trip across to Alison Morton’s blog, where I was sharing a few mental meanderings about historical truth and donkey poo. Alison is the author of the Roma Nova series, set in a world where the Roman Empire hasn’t fallen – so ‘historical truth’ is an interesting issue.

Then, while practially every other writer of historical fiction in the entire universe was at Harrogate (again, Alison’s blog will give you the low-down)...

Tabula Rasa UK – out on 23rd October!

The fine folk at Bloomsbury UK have almost finished doing the mysterious things that publishers do, and I’m delighted to say that TABULA RASA, the sixth Medicus tale, should be available here from 23rd October. That’s print and ebook: I’ll put up more info about the audio when I have it.

You can find out more about the story here.

I’m not sure a photo of a grinning (and rather hot) author clutching a book cover will encourage anyone to rush out and read it, but I went a long way for this pictur...

Welcome…

…and thank you for visiting.

I’m the author of a series of mysteries featuring Roman Army medic and reluctant sleuth, Gaius Petreius Ruso. His sixth adventure, TABULA RASA, has just been published in North America (tho’ friends in the UK will have to wait a bit longer). If you glance to the right you’ll see the cover.

Here’s what’s inside:

Ruso and his wife, Tilla, are back in the borderlands of Britannia, tending the builders of Hadrian’s Great Wall. Having been forced to move off their land, t...

Welcome…

…and thank you for visiting.

I’m the author of a series of mysteries featuring Roman Army medic and reluctant sleuth, Gaius Petreius Ruso. His sixth adventure, TABULA RASA, will be published any day now (tho’ friends in the UK will have to wait a bit longer). If you glance to the right you’ll see the cover.

Here’s what’s inside:

Ruso and his wife, Tilla, are back in the borderlands of Britannia, tending the builders of Hadrian’s Great Wall. Having been forced to move off their land, the Britons...